Sunday Meeting

On Sunday the 4th we met up for perhaps the last time outside of class, overhauling much of the game. I had some reservations about making so many changes in the last week when I'd liked what we had, but everyone else was adamant that the game as it then it existed was not fun or functional so I helped come up with some of the new ideas. In the end not as much changed as could have, but we did add new powers for the players, take away most powers the children had had, and also take away tower special abilities. The finished game is simpler and more streamlined as intended, so the meeting was a success.

More Rules

Sally, Matt, and I (Mike) met up on Friday and went over the rules again, focusing on the specific effects of the soldiers (towers) and the playable characters (defenders).

Each character has a soldier type they train (ex: Lord Licorice trains Licorice Lashers).  Each character can have these soldiers trained, although training the type you are responsible for is slightly discounted.

They have varied ranges from adjacent squares only (the Lashers) to up to 3 spaces away, which actually means they can hit up to 7 squares (Gloppy's Gloplings).

Each character also has a few special powers that can be used only a couple of times per game.  Some of these powers are very strong and a few seem very weak.  I'm still worried about game balance, however, they game has moved to a completely cooperative one.  Either all players win by holding out against the children or all players lose by failing to prevent the children from eating King Kandy.

We've got RULES!

November 16, 2011

Invaders (the children)

Base damage of towers: 1 hit point

Kids start: roll twice and are assigned those 2 abilities

1. pick a hero (there are 8 characters in total) & one base color

2. get resources based on the character we are OR get a fixed amount of resources (?)

3. everyone begins to build their towers based on their resources

4. kids are assigned abilities (roll and reference to chart)///roll 2 abilities per kid

*B, G, R, Y: kids move in alphabetical order (first letter of color)

5. the kids move according to the color cards they draw

6. Check if King Candy is alive (if he’s lost)

7. Player phase: ask for resources (trading)

a. Players can give resources for free (trade as they please)

b. Players then build towers and place them on their color

8. Kids move again (go back to step 5)

*if they land within range of a specific tower, that tower can shoot in their range

*equal credit to every tower that fires in that round

*when children die: everyone can get 1 resource per power that kid had

?::::(start with tough points equal to the hit points ….toughness 2: hit points 2)

?::::# of players = the # of hit points

--how many resources are the kids worth?

-when killed they are worth 12 resources

-divide by the # of players (those were involved in the killing)

-as a result every player gets an even amount of resources

(i.e. 12 divided by # of players)

**Every player that’s involved in a kill gets a token indicating that they contributed to that kill

-those who contribute to the killing get VICTORY points and resources

-every player (regardless if they contributed to the killing or not) gets resources

*if a player doesn’t contribute they get only resources, no victory points though

-when a kid dies their piece moves back to the beginning of the board, assign victory points or resources, the next “kid phase” the kid reappears and plays

POWERS FOR KIDS

1. Sugar HIGH

2. Hungry (eats the more powerful tower adjacent to him)

*determine ties with die roll

3. Sneak (is the next picture spot)

4. Determined (makes you immune: marching my way to the king)

5. Dodge (allows child to ignore the damage from the biggest tower)

*determine ties with die roll

6. Healer (regenerates 1 hit point per level of healer)

7. Tough (a bunch of additional hit points: 5 points)

8. Friendly (if he passes a kid, that kid draws a card and moves)

9. Plays dead (when he would otherwise be killed,

10. Extra bite (takes an extra bite of king candy at the end)

11. Fast (draw 2 color cards)

12. Armor: reduces damage a child takes by 1

November 9, 2011

• Everytime a kid dies, they come back and become stronger. Once they die, cards will be drawn to determine if their effects change and if so, which ones they get. They will become stronger as they die.
• Kids will move based on cards. We will have phases (one turn: defending tower, another turn: moving kids).
• We are keeping all of the original Candy Land game rules like movement.
• Protection Cards: Eats Everything, Likes the certain food, Certain Foods don’t effect him.
• No more than 4 kids at a time.
• Possible: We win after we kill 20 kids, or if all kids are killed in one single round
• choose character, get certain resources (corresponding to character), random distribution of characters/individually selected (?), when you kill a kid: relating to their “strengths” you gain resources, . Get 1 resources for killing one.
• Not physically building towers, we are placing down tokens.
• in order to build a tower, different resources are needed. Trading is allowed.
• Receive tokens when you successfully kill a kid or by drawing cards (Receive tokens based on color cards).

Tower Ideas

• (Damage, Cost, Range)
• Lollipop Halberd Guy
• Licorice Whip
• Mint Musketeers
• Cotton Candy Creeper
• Cupcake Canoneer   
• Plum Grenade (50% Chance of knocking them either direction, to be determined)
• Popsicle Freeze (slows you down)

(posted my Mike for Natalie)

The invaders!

I decided that we should have girl monsters too.  

These will be the trackers for the extra abilities the monsters gain (and may also end up being the figures that move around the board).

Playing with the Logo

Some more tweaking of the logo:

I also found a copy of the newest version of the game (subtitled "Kingdom of Sweet Adventures") for $4, so we have a few of the little kid tokens (which are monsters in our game) and the little cards they use to control movement in the original game.

Early Images

Some early versions of the graphics for the game.

November 2, 2011: Creative Brainstorming

As a group we have finalized our decision to go along with a Candy Land Insurrection theme where players are represented by characters from the original Candy Land. They have endured over 60 years of candy stealing and child play and it's about time to put an end to the madness! Every player comes equip with their own special abilities based on their character persona. The children have become the "invaders" and must be exterminated. Each player must defend their territory as well as ward off the children from the sweet land.

We have been discussing possible game rules and mechanics. Now that a theme has been established it is time to figure out how the players will deal with the "invaders" as they move across the board and terrorize the land. Players must defend their own proximity by building towers and shooting at the invaders. Figuring out how the towers will be constructed is our main concern as of this point. Tower ideas, player movement and art ideas are up for discussion....this may not be as sweet as it seems! Mint musketeers, lethal candy canes and the evil Gloppy man are all out to secure their land from the unwanted children.

By next week we will have abstract pieces (board included) to get a better idea of how we will want our game to play out. Beforehand we must start limiting our ideas in order to avoid future complications.

We Got GHAM!

Final Game Presentation Time.  I thought some of the presentations were very good, but a few were very weak.  I thought a few of the game ideas were interesting as well, although none jumped out at me in a "Ooo, I want to play that!" way.  I did like the squid, drink-roulette, and changing game board idea.

The Vote happens and I'm chosen as a leader. (For the record, I didn't vote for myself.)
I choose Sally Awad, Matt Hartman, and Natalie Mieles; I think I did well.
.
We gather and start talking about the game I presented, a multi-player Tower Defense board game, although I point out that if the others aren't interested, I'm more than willing to talk about other game ideas. Leader doesn't equal tyrant, after all, and it is a class about collaboration.
Natalie and Sally seem to like the Tower Defense idea, but Matt seems resistant. We discuss some other ideas. Matt likes one I threw away, "Candy Land Invasion." Perhaps we can reintegrate some of the ideas behind it.
We share our contact info with each other, and I email a copy of it to all of us.
We discuss opportunities for working on the game out of class, but are unable to come up with something that works very well for all of us. I think we all had early Sunday afternoons free. Unfortunately, both Natalie and Sally have long commutes. We talk about communicating a bit more online or using Google+'s new chat feature (I think it's called Hangouts).