At residency, I gave a workshop on how clear, meaningful game design philosophies can focus a project and solve problems in the mix. In the workshop, I asked my colleagues and contemporaries to help test a few new game modes for Scout.
When designing Scout, I scrapped a lot of complex systems in favor of clean, simple ones. I wanted to make a game with only the base components. A simple, stable system like Scout has the propensity for greater complexity without compromising balance, because new layers of complexity can be built into its reliable, consistent core mechanics. To test this, I challenged my contemporaries to help create new game modes without introducing any new game components. This is great for you, because you can play the new modes without buying anything new! And, it's great for me because, so can I! Here's what we came up with:
Hard Mode.
Deal 15 cards out of the deck at random. Eliminate these cards from play. Make sure the gumdrop remains in the main deck and shuffle it. Deal the remaining deck into three equal piles, and play. The empty space does not count as a cleared pile.
Legendary Mode.
Deal the entire deck into three equal piles, and play. The empty space does not count as a cleared pile.
Two-Player Mode.
Deal the deck into seven piles. Create a Scout game board with four piles. Create another adjacent game board out of the other three. The two boards will share the central pile.
Choose a player to go first. That player plays as normal until:
a. That player cannot make a legal move, or
b. That player kills a spider
Either resulting game-state passes the turn.
Both players may access the central pile, but otherwise, a player may only scout and clear piles on their side of the game board; with one exception.
The gumdrop, if visible, may be taken into a player's item slot on his or her turn from anywhere, including an opponent's pile or an opponent's item slot.
Have fun.
xoxo (CW) Alex
Posted Monday, Feb 10th 2014 @ 23:58