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E-Mail: ericp[AT]lariennalibrary.com


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Spaceship Rally

Page: GameIdea.GameIdea201004181225PM - Last Modified : Mon, 27 Jan 20 - 2336 Visits
How much do you like this idea?

3 stars Rating 6.0/10 from 1 votes
Vote Distribution: 0 – 0 – 0 – 1 – 0 – 0


Very Good (10/10) The game is very interesting, make it as soon as possible.
Good (8/10) Great idea but some modifications are required.
Fair (6/10) Interesting but a lot of things are missing.
Bad (4/10) Would need to completely redesign the idea in order to work.
Very Bad (2/10) It will never be interesting, abandon the idea.
Already Exist (0/10) Do not waste time of this game idea.

Status: CLOSED

  • Convert as a solitaire game. At most 2 player
  • solitaire essential for campaign progress
  • Maybe allow tactical board with maneuvering this way.
  • Too much undefined material yet, need to have a good idea of the mechanics.

Progress: Raw Idea
Priority: High
Number of players: 1 - 6 players
Expected Play time: 60 - 180 minutes

Description

You design and follow the deeds of a small space ship and it's crew that will perform various space rally. A rally is a series of objectives and obstacles that will give points. The better you perform, the more money you receive to pay your crew and upgrade your ship.

Objective

Make a game where you can follow the deeds of your crew and gear up your ship any way you like.

Inspiration

Blood bowl is a source of inspiration for the supervision and upgrade of you team but I never actually played blood bowl.

Priority Evaluation

Theme vs Mechanics: based on theme, I have little idea of which mechanic to used so far.
Video vs Board Game: There is no really restrictions of medium for this game.
Single vs Multi player: Originally multiplayer, the more I think about this game the more it should be a single player game since there a campaign issue, and lack of conflict between players. 2 players playing the same track at most.
Rating = 4/12

Digitizability

? Cartography: Maps could be used, but they might not be necessary.
? No Scripting: There should not be any special powers, unless maps are not used. Only keywords should be present.

Mechanics

I want to have a game where you feel that you are actually gearing up and customizing your ship. The problem is that I might not want to have huge rule books, like in blood bowl, with tons of stats and modifiers. So I was thinking to use my stat deck idea where configuring your ship would mean configuring your deck.

You will have a space racing track that might not be too much tactical. If you fight against other players, there will probably not be a tactical battle field. You move from 1 location to another and each location has a number of things that can happen.

Either you need to do something with your ship or either you need to land with characters on a planet, ship or station. You need to do certain stuff to gain points. Sometimes being first is useful, sometimes being the best gives more points. The player with the most points win the race and the higher you are in the ranking the more money you receive.

Problems that prevent development

What I don't like of blood bowl is that you start weak and you end up strong. So I want to have a system where it does not create a great difference between new and old ships/characters. Maybe it could be more about maintaining, repairing and reconfiguring the ship rather than upgrading the ship.

I also need to have a way to play the game out of the box, no customization of the crew and ships, for people who only wants to play the game once. It must also be possible that players which have their ship could play with other players with ships out from the box and have a fair game.

News, changes and updates

November 1st 2010: I had a new idea of using a dice system like express dice game (ex: dune express). Instead of having a deck of cards for your actions, you would roll a certain number of dice according to the stats of your vehicle. It is possible that there are multiple categories of dice. Then according to the stats of your character, you will be allowed to re-roll a certain number of dice for each category.

Then you use your results to perform your actions. For example, shield rolls could make you reduce damage, aim rolls makes you attack hits, etc. Some equipment cards would require a certain number of roll to be used. For example, you could have a power shell equipment card that requires 2 shield roll to be activated.

I intend to use a system like that for different games where I wanted to use a stat deck system. One of the advantage of dice is that it's easier to assemble when published as print and play. But if you want custom dices, it's a bit more complicated to assemble than using regular dices.

Related Threads

Board game Geek: how to implement Skill rolls with dice manipulation? (2016)
Board Game Designer Forum: how to implement Skill rolls with dice manipulation? (2016)

Development Log

DateTypeDescription
4-jul-2017IdeaCould use a dice system similar to deep space D6 or the better improver star trek dice. Thinking more to use a system when each character on the ship roll x dice and value changes according to how it is used depending on the character's stats. So the payer will have to decide where it's the best place to use the strong and weak dices.
16-aug-2016Ideathe idea to spend time or other resources to force a success like in my ninja game idea could be applied here too. Time spent would reduce your ranking the race making you gain less points. Not a huge est back but still, could have an impact when using a campaign mode.
16-aug-2016IdeaI discovered another game I will play soon called "1572: The Lost Expedition". I am thinking that my game idea could fit and a pen and paper game and take many ideas from this lost expedition games. In my game, you always move only forward, resources deplete and never replenish before the end of the race. So it could make sense to have a pen and paper version.
17-Jun-2016ideaI discovered a game called "Deep Space D-6" which is a dice game where you use your crew represented as dice to perform various task to overcome threath. A similar system could be used, maybe each character has skills and can assign the dice he rolls in various ways
8-Jun-2014IdeaIt could be possible to make an excellent single player game, since regular racing rally are not directlly competing with each other. So you could have a solo game where you have challenge that gives you points and you also gain points for speed. You would not see the other player's time, only a table saying how much points you get if completed at a certain speed. Finishing fast is not the only way to make points, but just one way to do it. Then points could be converted as money for ship repair and upgrades.
8-Jun-2014IdeaThe "Race" could be a series of cards. Where one is a challenge, then the next is an obstacle. Then alternate between challenge and obstacle. I am not sur if I want a tactical movement map. It could add a certain depth to the game by allowing maneuvering yoru ship. But in space, there are not much terrain to avoid. So having a series of obstacles and challenge seems more logical.
29-Sep-2013IdeaAfter playing space cadet duel, the idea of making a dice game could be another option. I was thinking to have 3 type of face with either 1 or 2 icons that each represents one of the 3 jobs of the crew. Set a die aside each turn like other express dice games and assign them to various task.
15-Apr-2013IdeaI had an idea to use a movement system similar to Tokaido where the speed will limit movement. But I am not really sure because there needs to be a lot of reason to stop for something, while in my game you try to avoid obstacles.

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