Report To The Stakeholders

[brehaut]

Thanks Paul, and sorry about that erronous attribution.

[Not another shrubbery]

Originally Posted by Paul

Be gentle with that donkey.

"When I say WHOA, I mean WHOA!"

heh

Well... so it was a camel :/

[GoodGame]

Originally Posted by Almafeta

Or Age of Empires/Civilization meets Munchkin... King Munchkin? "Kill your ally, sack their capitals." Expansions could be 'side boards' with their own decks of themed cards.

Great with AH's Advanced Civ mini-trading game. You mean as a Risk-style capture territory boardgame in that vein? "What, I can't capture that territory cuz I'm down to one army? "Presto---my Magi-Munchkin hero can do it by herself!"

CIV4 with its new power-ups type system for units could be Munchkin satire (though actually they're kind of well-designed).

[xlyce]

Originally Posted by GoodGame

Perhaps start with that as the base (build supers by cards), but throw in a track board a la Talisman. For the Euro-theme, as painted wooden blocks, tile-placement, and victory points. Perhaps the board is made from geo-morphic tiles, placed by the players as the game progresses. Board squares represent physical locations of the players's teams, adventures, and strategic places. The wood blocks represent spheres of influence captured on the board squares.
Players conflict using their card powers against each other for control of squares, or vs. the programmed events at the board squares (e.g. land on Go, and fight a battle to collect $200)

Scoring is by trading in wood blocks at the end of each turn. Victory decided by final score at turn x.

Sounds like a mega-board game to me in the SJG vein.


Alternatively----UBER-Munchkin. Munchkin with the added thrill of a Monopoly type track board, with a Talisman-type adventure board in the center. Players 'level-up' in the Monopoly track to clear easy dungeons, claim real-estate, and develop the property (luxury hotels, castles, fiefs), reaping special resources (a la Euro-style colored wood blocks) used to purchase items and powers from special decks not available in the main Munchkin deck. <Charge your fellow munchkins rent, or have your slavish minions build super munchkin items>
Throw in cardboard heroes to traverse the deck, and enter the Talisman-style central board to defeat the randomally drawn evil badie and win the game!

Two comments on these ideas for a SJG board game.

1) Please, not a roll and move (Talisman, Monopoly etc). It will not sell except to SJG faithful (well except me). Instead they should go more towards a game with tough decisions like rpgs contain. How about something using secret bidding to determine if you get a superpower. Winners trade in hero points to improve their skills and everyone keeps half of their points. After each round of bidding they would improve their characters with the highest bidder getting first pick and going down from there.

The players would then do a task, not sure how they would be given them though.

2) If SJ Games wants to crack the Eurogames market they have to do several things.
a) make the game challenging but not too random. Eurogamers hate too much randomness
b) keep the "take that" ability and minimise it, EGers dislike take that. Look at the most popular BGG games and none of them are direct "take that" games. There is player screwage but it is all indirect.
c) Make the game attractive. I own Munchkin, Burn in Hell and a couple of other SJG games but I dislike the quality of the cards (and the cost associated with the current games). This leads into:
d) make the pieces high quality, eurogames are not just about the pieces, they are also about the game play and how the players interact (or don't in some places).
e) Theme in a eurogame is not as important to a eurogamer as it is to a typical RPGer (or Munchkin fan). So if you make a theme heavy game, it cannot disguise the mechanics.

Or I could be wrong about everything... ;)

[GoodGame]

Instead of a single roll and move, why not a Backgammon-esque system. Split your roll between your team, or make movement an aspect of the superpower system (and take out the dice).

Originally Posted by xlyce

Two comments on these ideas for a SJG board game.

1) Please, not a roll and move (Talisman, Monopoly etc). It will not sell except to SJG faithful (well except me). Instead they should go more towards a game with tough decisions like rpgs contain. How about something using secret bidding to determine if you get a superpower. Winners trade in hero points to improve their skills and everyone keeps half of their points. After each round of bidding they would improve their characters with the highest bidder getting first pick and going down from there.

The players would then do a task, not sure how they would be given them though.

[JAW]

Asimows start traders (an old SJG boardgame) has interesting roll-mowement you roll to see if you can mowe where you wan't (through jump-hyperspace..). I rather like it as it allows to play it (relatively) safe with small jumps or take risks attempting longer ones. I'd like to see more of something like that in board/card games. Maybe ewn poker-like game mechnics of betting or something - rolling dice or drawing cards is just more exiting when you hawe somehow decided yourself how much is at risk there - ewen if the things are only imaginary and in-game so that it doesnt become actual gambling..

[smgray1]

But not one word about OGRE/GEV.....

:(

[misterbaldy]

This is my first actual post to this forum, and it is probably as good a place as any to begin.

Steve,
It's quite refreshing to see a company being up front with it's fan-base/stakeholders. I recently purchased the following:

• GURPS (4th Ed.) Characters
• GURPS (4th Ed.) Campaigns
• GURPS (4th Ed.) Powers
• GURPS (4th Ed.) Space
• GURPS (4th Ed.) Bio-tech
• GURPS (4th Ed.) GM's Screen

I must say that I am quite impressed with the quality of the work. As a long time HERO Games supporter (since 1981, to be exact), I have become disillusioned with the direction that the company (HERO/DOJ), and it's product line is going in.

I have always told my friend John that SJG has always turned out some of the best sourcebooks for RPGs (My favorite is still GURPS Atomic Horror), but I would never play GURPS. For the most part, I rationalized and reassuredly said to myself, "Why should I play GURPS...I have HERO."

HERO has become a monster to me. It's 5th Edition Revised is overly complicated, difficult to use...and sadly overdone. When you absolutely MUST have a computer program to aid you in character creation...you have a problem.

Well, after all these years...you got me. I bought GURPS 4th Edition. For the most part, it's not so much as a substitute for HERO, but more it is that I have finally "seen the light", as it were.

Like I had said previously, I have always felt that SJG has turned out some of the best RPG suppliments to date..."So, why not use the game system that they were intended for?"

So Steve, like I said at the beginning of this post...It's nice to see a company being so up front, and listening to its fan-base/stakeholders. You have a new GURPS fan, and someone who has been a gamer for a long time (over 30 years now). I cut my RPG teeth on D&D and Traveller, Played White Wolf's Vampire: The Masquerade for quite a few years, and was a long time HERO Games fan. I played many of your products for years (OGRE/GEV, Car Wars, Melee, Wizard). Sadly, I lost almost all of my gaming stuff in a fire about 9 years ago, and have been slowly rebuilding my library of games.

I am glad to say, GURPS (4th Edition) is now a new addition to that library. It's taken me a long time to realize it, but I finally have.

Thanks for continuing to turn out high quality and affordable games. Keep up the good work.

Sincerely, from , from a long time gamer, and a new (and very happy) GURPS fan,
Joseph E. Geer
(a.k.a., misterbaldy)

[ravenfish]

Originally Posted by xlyce

1) Please, not a roll and move (Talisman, Monopoly etc). It will not sell except to SJG faithful (well except me).

Funnily enough, both 'roll and move' games you mention are considered classics, and appear to have had no sales trouble.

[jspade]

Steve;

Thanks again for keeping us informed about the business side of things. It's always good to hear that a company that produces product you love is doing well.

While I'm not a Munchkin player, I'm glad it's doing well. Whatever it takes to support GURPS. I'm also oddly pleased to see GURPS support shifting toward e23; these days, I get a lot more use out of my electronic GURPS books than my dead-tree editions, just because of the sheer convenience of having them on my laptop where I do most of my game preparation. I don't suppose the shift in priorities will allow you to reconsider putting the Basic Set on e23?

As far as digital games go, I'm not sorry to you stop making such an effort in that area. Frankly, there are plenty of publishers who do the digital side of things adequately well. I think e23 plays to your strengths, excellent writing and game design, and doesn't require developing new expertise.

I hope 2008 is a profitable year, for you. And the year that GURPS unseats Monopoly.