Assuming that Capitalisation (or control of Capitalisation) remains the most attractive early action in the game (an argument I’m having difficulty supporting):

• (E7/D5/C3)
• P1-C3/3 P2/C3/3 P3-C3/2 P4-D1/1 P4-D1/2¹ P4-E2/4² (E6/D3/C0)
• P1-D1/4³ P2-D1/4³ P3-D1/4⁵ (E6/D0/C0]

Total actions performed: 9

Total actions per player: P1:2 P2:2, P3:3, P4:3

Now let’s assume that P1 recognises the action race and changes tempo:

• (E7/D5/C3)
• P1-C3/3 P2/C3/3 P3-C3/2 P4-D1/1 P4-D1/2⁶ P4-E2/4 (E6/D3/C0)
• P1-E2/5⁷ P2-E2/5 P3-E2/5 P4-E2/6 ⁸ (E1/D4/C0)
• P1-E2/7⁹ (E0/D4/C0)

Total actions performed: 11

Total actions per player: P1:3 P2:2, P3:2, P4:4

Interesting.

Let’s assume that P4 wins one of the early share auctions with his cash lead and thus has more he can develop:

• (E7/D5/C3)
• P1-C3/3 P2/C3/3 P3-C3/2 P4-D1/1 P4-D1/2 P4-D1/3 (E7/D2/C0)
• P1-E1/5¹⁰ P2-E2/5[^111] P3-E2/5¹² P4-E2/5 (E3/D2/C0)
• P1-D1/6¹³ P2-D1/6¹⁴ (E3/D0/C0)

Total actions performed: 12

Total actions per player: P1:3 P2:3, P3:2, P4:4

Now let’s assume that P1 is cash poor, diluted on both sides and that P2 in similarly incented towards a fast dividend:

• (E7/D5/C3)
• P1-C3/3 P2/C3/3 P3-C3/2 P4-D1/1 P4-D1/2 P4-D1/3 (E7/D2/C0)
• P1-D1/4 P2-D1/4 (E7/D0/C0]

Total actions performed: 8

Total actions per player: P1:2 P2:2, P3:1, P4:3

This is fascinating. The players have no choice but to focus on Expansion next turn as there’s just no opportunity for any more Development. What interesting rhythms!

Ooops. I just noticed that one of the side effects of nesting the game-project categories is that the RSS feed URLs for the categories have now changed to represent the nesting. Arghh. Sorry guys. If this is a real problem please comment below and I’ll stick in some Apache rewrite rules to handle it.

A more tactically interesting turn:

• (E7/D5/C3)
• P1-E2/2 P2-E2/2 P3-E2/2 P4-C3/3 (E4/D5/C2) (no change)
• P1-D1/3 P2-D1/3 P3-C3/5 (E4/D3/C1) (no change)
• P1-E2/5¹ P2-C3/6 P4-E2/5² (E2/D3/C0)
• P1-E2/7³ P3-E2/7⁴ (E0/D3/C0)

Total actions performed: 12

Total actions per player: P1:4 P2:3, P3:3, P4:2

Note that the round ended due to exhausted actions at the same time as it ended for total action points. This may be deceptively convenient, in which case the reins will need to be drawn in a bit. More interesting is the turn-penalty for being late in the turn order. How curious! Is this the coat-tail-riding forced-alliances of Preußische Ostbahn, or is it just bad to have cash? How very appealingly curious. It might be time to build a small AI to model a few basic player incentive assumptions and see how this pattern plays out.

Somehow I seem to keep returning to the action selection and turn order mechanism in Muck & Brass. The current Pampas Railroads and Wabash Cannonball is a little unstable when employed for the very cash and share-sensitive Muck & Brass. I’m not convinced it needs changing, but I’m also not convinced it doesn’t. An unpleasant kettle.

I’ve been looking at a variation on the previously discussed and dismissed model, but losing the sliding concept and using a fixed tie-breaker for collisions.

• There is a grid of action squares, one row per player. 7 columns long
• Players start with a marker in the first column of one the rows of the chart, ordered by increasing personal cash going down (this could change, see below)
• The player whose marker is furthest to the left and closest to the top (tie breaker) has the current turn
• There are three action tracks (Expand, Develop, Capitalise) but likely with a different distribution: 7/5/3(?)
• On their turn a player selects an available action, moves the cube on the track in the standard manner and does the action (not optional?)
• Upon completion of the action the player’s cube is moved forward on the action chart per the cost of the action (Expand: 2, Develop: 1, Capitalise: 3?)¹
• The next/same player (leftmost/top) now takes their turn, etc etc
• When two actions are exhausted or two players reach or pass the end column of the chart dividends are paid in the normal fashion and the action tracks reset

Possibly the turn order tie-breaker, after the first round, can instead of cash be the reverse order of total action points used in the last round; the implications aren’t obvious to me.

An example opening round using the format Player-ActionCost/ActionTotal followed by a summary of how many of each action are left is listed below, one line per re-ordering:

• (E7/D5/C3)
• P1-E2/2 P2-E2/2 P3-E2/2 P4-C3/3 (E4/D5/C2)
• P1-D1/3 P2-D1/3 P3-C3/5 (E4/D3/C1)
• P1-D1/4 P2-C3/6 P4-D1/5 (E4/D1/C0)
• P1-E2/6 P3-E2/7 P4-E2/7 (E1/D1/C0)

Total actions performed: 13

Typical total actions per round in Wabash Cannonball: 8

Typical total actions per round in Pampas Railroads: 9-10

Total actions per player: P1:4 P2:3, P3:3, P4:3

I’ve made little attempt to make action choices logical. This is just a thought model. Most noticeable is that the rounds is longer (more actions done in the round). This may be acceptable, albeit at a cost in game length. My surface sense is that the tactical choices in this ordering are interesting and rather tweaky.

In order to ease managment and overview of the site I’ve created a Game Project category and moved all my design projects under it. Aside from some resultant sorting and nesting of the category list, there’s also now an RSS feed for just my game projects. See the This Category link in the sidebar when viewing the category.

I will be closing the order line for the Winsome Games’ 2008 Essen Collection in a few days. By rough estimation I’ll have the games by the second week of November and will be shipping them out then.

Turn structure

The base idea is a set of rounds, each round consisting of distinct phases executed in order by each player before moving onto the next phase or round:

• Construction
• Operation
• Resolution

Turn order is rotational. Start player moves back one space each round.

Construction

Players have 2 action points. Available actions:

• Purchase a colony (2AP)
• Cost dependent on level
• Place colony (1AP)
• Placement limitations:
  • 3 edges from nearest colony for level-1
  • 3 edges from nearest level-1 colony and 5 edges from nearest level-2 for level-2 colonies
  • 3 edges from nearest level1 colony, 5 edges from nearest level-2 and 7 edges from nearest level-3 for level-3 colonies
• Colony may upgrade previously placed colony by same or other player
  • New placement
    • Connected routes for new colony must pay docking fees of $2 per route in promissory notes to colony owner
  • Upgrade placement and new owner:
    • Previous owner gives promissory notes to new owner equal to half-cost of current docks
• All exploration bonuses leading to colony are claimed
• Spaceships present on node are docked (returned to player)
• Purchase and place factory (1AP)
• Cost is a function of level
• May be placed on other player’s colonies
• Factories come in three levels (1/2/3) and size (1/2/4) and produce goods of their ssize
  • Level-1 factories come in 3 primary colours
  • Level-2 factories come in 3 different secondary colours and accept their constituent primaries as inputs
  • Level-3 factories are black and accept any two different secondary colours as inputs
  • Sale price for a good is market price*size
  • Large(r) size goods can be delivered to small(er) factories where they count as a single input
• Placed factory may not be same colour as the input or output of a factory already on colony
• Sum of factory sizes on colony limited by level of colony (1/3/7)
• May upgrade previously placed factory for delta cost
• Placement of size-3 factory causes all connected size-1 factories to rust (removed from board)
• Advance travelling spaceship one edge (1AP)
• Double speed if on already explored edge
• Move docked spaceship to connected colony and advance one edge (1 AP)

Player’s travelling spaceships which are not advanced during turn are removed from the board along with the paths they explored.

Operation

The Operation phase is split into three steps:

1. For each player in turn order:
2. Produce products on all level-1 (input-less) factories
3. Move products across network to consumers - Pay for network transit per colour - Owner of product pays market price (forced) for product - May not delivery to factory if an input of that colour is already present
4. For each player in turn order:
5. Produce products on all level-2 factories that have both inputs
6. Move products across network to consumers - Pay for network transit per colour - Owner of product pays market price (forced) for product
7. For each player in turn order:
8. Produce products on all level-3 factories that have both inputs
9. Move products across network to consumers - Pay for network transit per colour - Owner of factory received market price from bank

Resolution

The Resolution phase is split into three steps:

1. For each colour of level-1 factories adjust the market price for that colour:
   • down if there are unshipped goods of that colour
   • up if all products of that colour were consumed to produce level-2 products
   • no-change if all products of that colour were shipped but not all were consumed
2. Each player now exchanges promissory notes with their owners to reduce the number of notes in the game to a minimum (trade a player’s promissory notes with that player for notes they hold of other players, repeat until no further exchanges are possible).
3. Each player pays all promissory notes other players hold of their’s.

Other

Preferably game ends when bank breaks.

I’m concerned that Operations and Resolution are horribly fiddly. Transaction density is a problem.

Basic patterns:

• Network growth is slow and beginning a spur commits the player for 2-3 turns as a failure to extend an incomplete link on a turn looses the spur
  • Network occurs on a penrose mesh
  • Growth spreads from central hub
• Reaching previously untouched nodes rewards money when the spur is terminated at a colony (cf Through the Desert tokens)
• Colonies (which are placed on nodes) cost both money and an entire turn to purchase, plus an action to place
  • Ergo colonies are purchased on spec and then placed as/when advantageous
• Like networks, colonies are owned by the constructing player
• Colonies can be upgraded/scaled by any connected player
  • The upgrader owns the big colony, the original builder the inner hub
  • Size of colony limited by number of connected colours
• There are placement distance rules for different size colonies
• Colonies may contain factories
• Factories are either original producers (no inputs) or require input supplies before production.
  • Three base factory types (no inputs)
  • Three secondary factory types (requires two different-type base-type inputs)
  • One terminal-type factory (requires two different-type secondary-type inputs)
• Factories cost money to buy and an action to place
• A factory may not be built on a colony which contains a factory which accepts that product as either an input or an ouput
• Factories come in 3 size scalings, each requiring a bigger host colony
• Size 3 factories cause all size 1 factories to rust
• Between network manipulation rounds players produce on their factories and feed their goods across the network to other factories etc in production chains
  • Money is paid for sold goods, network use etc.
  • Long term commitments (eg factory hosting on colonies are represented by promissory notes issued by factory owners (pay $X to bearer every round)
  • Promissory notes may be traded collapsed in standard logical reduction fashion
• Factory goods have a small 18XX-esque market
  • Goods which can’t be consumed drive prices down
  • Goods which are fully consumed drive prices up
  • The ranges are fairly small(?)
• Game is ended based on factory construction (N rounds with size 3 terminal factory) or bank breaking
  • End game score is cash
  • Promissory notes are worth cash at some exchange rate

Getting the costs/values right will be interesting.

I’ve been noodling a game tentatively called Space Race for a few months now. Inspired by Clippers (which I’ve been playing a lot of), Indonesia, Wayfinder, ‘Ohana Proa and the 18XX, the intent is for the players to simulate a producer/consumer pipeline across an emergent transport network between nodes that the players also provide and define. A very free-form game.

A few of the other basic intentions:

• Economies of scale mostly won’t
• An amusing argument against Seth Jafee’s Ship vs Build game model
• Also an argument against the general Multiple Paths to Victory view of games (I find it a near meaningless term)
• No (few) proper nouns – a fully emergent game with little to no prior definition, just emergent patterns

Much of the old crew got together for a farewell lunch at Trends today. It was great to see everyone again, shake hands, eat good food and perhaps even to remember the late nights, all the projects we together carried over the line despite, and more than all that, what great people they are to know and work with. Thank you.

Sadly a few couldn’t make it (there was an All-Hands-On-Deck). Life happens and sometimes the bear does get you first. But never fear, we’ll have another lunch with them tomorrow.