I
occasionally like to highlight and discuss interesting game elements I notice,
whether they can actually influence or inspire my own game design work. Collins
Epic Wargames’
Spearpoint 1943 by
Byron Collins impressed me with its multi-faceted damage cards and overall
smooth interpretation of World War II tactical skirmishes in a card game
format. Tasty Minstrel Games’
Coin Age
by Adam McIver incorporates an innovative mechanic in which the random elements
determining what actions one can take also serve as the pieces one places, all
on a “micro” map that can fit in your pocket. By sheer coincidence both games are
running Kickstarter funding campaigns, though
Coin Age’s ends in the next few days.
I first
noticed this game while attending a small miniatures wargaming convention in
Williamsburg, VA, where the creator was running demos. A friend who manages a
comics and gaming store showed me a demo copy and was particularly impressed
with the damage card mechanic, which, on first glance, offered a different
damage complication on each of its four edges corresponding to one of the four
unit types (infantry, tanks, aircraft, and artillery). I’ve had my eye on the
game ever since -- in a casual sort of way -- but always hesitated at the
$29.99 price tag. This past Thanksgiving Collins Epic Wargames had a Black
Friday sale that, even with shipping, brought the game into my acceptable price
range…so I ordered a copy that was promptly delivered two days later.
The game
comes with 50 cards each detailing German and American forces, 25 command cards
with advantages and special actions to play as the skirmish develops, and 25
damage cards. Players customize a force based on card points, deploy several
units, then engage in combat. The skirmish game concept reminds me somewhat of
what I’ve read about Up Front, the
card game version of Avalon Hill’s venerable Squad Leader, though I imagine Spearpoint
1943 is a bit more streamlined than that hard-core wargame.
During the
course of combat units can sustain damage in the form of points deducted from
their endurance (a numerical value indicative of overall strength). Spearpoint 1943 employs an elegant
little mechanic in which a card keeps taking damage throughout the turn, but at
the turn’s end it defaults back to either full endurance or, if damaged below
half endurance but not yet destroyed, then back to half endurance. Any unit
taking more than half its endurance in damage also draws a damage card. Each
edge of the card contains text for specific damage effects to one of the four
unit types. Tucking the card beneath the damaged unit -- with the specific
damage effect edge text showing -- also reminds players the unit’s now at half endurance.
Spearpoint 1943 also uses a few other
innovative mechanics I like. The game requires players to commit crew cards
when putting vehicles and artillery into play. This might seem like an
unnecessary detail in a basic skirmish game, but functions as game balance for
more powerful units. Players initially deploy only four cards, so a vehicle
card and crew card to make that vehicle operational take up two card spaces
that might otherwise go to two infantry units. In playing additional forces
from one’s hand one must wait until both a vehicle and the associated crew
appear when drawing from the reserve deck.
While the
cards at first seem overly complicated with many different stats and the rules
might seem a little overwhelming as players try to put together all the numbers
and procedures, the mechanics work intuitively when everything’s put together
on the game table. (I wouldn’t mind finding rules for solitaire play….) Although
the interesting elements I admire don’t seem to fit into any games I’m
developing right now, they’re certainly approaches I’ll keep in mind for the
future.
Collins Epic Wargames is currently running a Kickstarter campaign to fund a version of the
game set on the Russian front (the original
Spearpoint
1943 covers tactical engagements during the campaign in Italy in 1943).
While I’m not planning on backing this particular version of the game -- I’m
not really a huge fan of action on the Eastern Front -- I’d love to see a
version covering German and British skirmishes in North Africa in 1942-43.
Billed as an
“area control microgame,”
Coin Age
consists of a credit-card sized map with four similarly sized pages of rules;
players provide the “pieces” using pocket change (one quarter, two nickels, three
pennies, and four dimes for each player), though the Kickstarter campaign has
already funded the stretch goal of a set of punchboard coins.
The game’s
innovative mechanic involves using the coins not only as randomizers to
determine player actions but as available pieces to place on the map to control
territories. One player is “heads” and the other “tails,” enabling all coins to
serve as double-sided counters on the board. Players “roll” (or more accurately
“slap!” as demonstrated by the Kickstarter video) the two-sided randomizers
(“coins”), with the combination of heads or tails to match the player’s side
determining what actions the player can take: placing one, two, or three coins
matching the player’s side, moving an already placed piece to an open
territory, or even capturing an already placed piece and adding it to their
“bank” of available coins to “roll.”
Players
aren’t limited to placing pieces on empty territories; they can put a piece on an
opponent’s piece on the board as long as the coin is physically smaller than
the one upon which they’re stacking. For instance, a player might put a nickel
on top of their opponent’s quarter, taking that territory as their own; but
their opponent can re-take the area with a penny or dime on a later turn.
The game
ends -- and the scoring begins -- after someone claims the last open territory
or uses up all their coins. Scoring not only depends on who holds the most
territories, but who has majority control of several “regions” consisting of
one, two, three, or four spaces. Smaller coins score fewer points than the
larger coins, which are already scarce within each players’ bank of available
pieces.
Both the
“randomizers as pieces” concept and the “stacking territory capture” elements
appeal to me, though not for any game I currently have in mind. I could easily
see rolling dice and using them with the values they roll as pieces of
different strengths (and I’m sure someone’s already done it somewhere).
Stacking pieces to capture areas from lesser-value pieces also adds a good bit
of strategy to the game: if you make a grab for someone else’s territory you do
so at a lower-scoring point value. (Hmmm, the stacking capture mechanic might
work for a Gordon Relief Expedition game I’ve causally had in the back of my
mind….)
Free PDF: Regardless of whether you
back it, you can still preview and play the game for free with the PDF download
rules and board available at the Kickstarter website. Try before you buy, so to
speak.
Low Price Point: The minimum backer
level (including shipping anywhere in the world) is a minimum $3, with a
suggested “donation” of $5. When was the last time you paid $5 for a well-nuanced
strategy game?
Stretch Goals for Everyone: The Coin Age Kickstarter campaign offers a
veritable horde of stretch goals that apply to everyone backing the game. As of
this writing people who back the game at
any level get an additional map on durable “credit card-like” material,
cardboard coin tokens (so you can save your change), stickers with the
cardboard coin token design to apply to real coins, and -- yet to be unlocked at
this time -- one or two additional maps! All this in addition to the originally
promised main microgame board and rules. No add-ons or exclusive stretch goals
for those backing at extremely expensive levels…just basic rewards for everyone
to celebrate the game’s Kickstarter successes.
Support Our Troops: Midway through the
campaign Tasty Minstrel Games added an extra backer level in which supporters could
not only get copies of the game for themselves, but could also pay to have
copies sent to troops overseas through the
Operation Gratitude organization. [
Edit: Kickstarter administration has since rescinded this pledge level as it supposedly violates their terms in not donating funds to charities...the exact wording and intent of which backers have debated -- and expressed their displeasure with -- at the
Coin Age crowdfunding page.]
Ultimately I
backed this project for multiple copies, one for myself and a few as gifts for
friends.
As always, I
encourage constructive feedback and civilized discussion. Share a link to this
blog entry on Google+ and tag me (+Peter Schweighofer) to comment.
