Using a fully customizable board is too much for the scope of this game. Working on a board setup for 45 minutes when I want to play BattleLore is ok, but not if I want to play a quick game of DROD... Game like BattleLore and Catan are based on complicated base material (War and resources development/gathering), but a DROD board game would be based on DROD, which has pretty simple rules, so making them complicated wouldn't fit.
calamarain: Yeah I like that cheap ass game thing.
Following those ideas would probably mean not using "
movement cards"
as printing a bunch of cards might be a burden for the players, but I can't figure out other ways for movement that would make the game more than just a game of chance (like with dices). If anyone knows a mechanism that allow to play with dice, but with some strategy to it, please share
Of course, we could use a regular playing deck with simple rules. Remove all the cards between 6-10, keep the 1-5 cards for movements, and the Jack or better as rotation cards. But this will not allow for "
cooler"
DROD themed cards, like a card that allow you to deploy a mimic, spawn a creature in your opponent's room and whatsnot.
If we are going to use A4 or letter paper, each "
dungeon section"
will be 8x10 floor tiles (thats assuming a 1"
x1"
floor tile size) and that might not be enough to create a big enough dungeon for 4 players... 1"
x1"
is great because we could use standards D&D/Game workshop figurines on it, which would look better than a paper game piece, and if we find a figure with a big enough sword, it might even be used to show Beethro's orientation
We'll probably have to define the game equipment before defining any rules, but we might have to define the rules to know what equipment we need
Anyway, in my head, and assuming that we use a combination of movement cards and a room based modular board, a simple turn sequence would be :
-Define Initiative (through some undetermined way) This is for two reasons : To vary the gameplay sequences, and to determine which players the critters will go after in a situation when 2 or more players are in the same room.
-Each players put their "
movement"
cards in play in secret, behind a screen or just by playing them face down (between 1-5 cards, depending on the hand size)
-Based on initiative, each player show and play their 1st movement card. So the "
quickest"
player plays first. The next quickest player show a card and plays it, and so on until everyone played all of their cards.
You can't move on a tile occupied by a player already. If it happen, you lose your movement. Some rule could be determined based on initiative too.
Alternatively, if you walk into the a space in front of a player's sword, you die and respawn in your starting room.
Assuming that every movement are done at the same time, this would mean that if you walk in a sword path AND any other players are in YOUR sword's path (including the player who is about to kill you), that player dies too. So dying can actually be used as a "
grand stand"
where you can try to take other players with you.
-Any critters in the player sword's path dies and that player takes it as a victory counter.
-Being placed randomly, it might be impossible to make it that the critters are "
strategically"
placed to be killable, like in DROD. So a critter that touches you will not kill you. Instead the critter is removed from play and you lose 1 victory token.
If you don't have enough victory points, you die and respawn.
-The players refill their hands with X cards, to replace their movement cards.
-Critters with one or more player in their room moves. If there is more than one player, the slowest one becomes the target. If the "
quickest"
player find himself in the path of a critter, it's just too bad for him
(unless he has some "
quick escape"
card in hand or whatever)
Critters would move in a simplified mimic of DROD. For example, roaches would always move to the closest tile toward the player, prefering a left/right move before a up/down one (in case of an impassable tile) and bats would do the same but ignore impassable tiles.
Those movements would be decided by all the player together, so the rules have to be simple enough not to confuse everyone.
-Define initiative and restart the turn
Thats pretty much where I am so far... Winning would be with the victory points, but other mode of play could be cool too (2vs2 capture the flag, which you lose of you die and so on)
Wow, I didn't realize how long that was... Hopefully my grammar is not too awfull...