Page: GameIdea.GameIdea201007030949PM - Last Modified : Mon, 27 Jan 20 - 2000 Visits

How much do you like this idea? Not rated yet Already Exist Very bad Bad Fair Good Very Good
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 on this game idea.

Status: CLOSED

• Single player game possible
• Need to do mechanics searching
• Hard time finding a theme for it.
• Could be a system to adapt to many theme.

Progress: Raw Idea
Priority: Low
Number of players: 2 - 4 players
Expected Play time: 30 - 60 minutes

Description

A card game that use tarot size cards. Each card has a unique name and can be used differently in various situations. The goal is to destroy your opponents cards.

Objective

I was fascinated on how tarot cards were placed on the table. I wanted to make a game about tarot cards that would allow you to place cards in various ways to get different effects.

Inspiration

Besides tarot deck, there are no primary source of inspirations.

Priority Evaluation

Theme vs Mechanics: It's based on using tarot cards and spread, but there is not really any mechanics attached to it.
Video vs Board Game: Could be implemented on both platform
Single vs Multi player: Orgiginally thought of 2 player, but maybe could be single player.
Rating = 6/12

Digitizability

+ No Cartography: There is no cartography, but the cards are placed in certain slots.
- Scripting: Since every card can have many unique abilites, it should require scripting.

Mechanics

There will be a deck of approximately 100 cards and each player will play with a smalll deck of approximately 16 cards. Each deck would represent a concept and the card would be classified in 5 elements (suites).

Since players has few cards I could not create a game that only ad "take that" cards. The placement of cards was important to recreate the tarot feeling. So I was thinking that each cards could have various way to get used. Some of the ways will have a special text on the card, while other usage methods will only use the strength value of the card. Since the cards are tarot sized, there would be some space to place a lot of text.

You would be able to place cards around or over your deck of cards. Each position will have various effects. For example, placing a card in front will offer defense, the side will offer offense, and the back card will boost all the other cards. There will also be many other playing possibilities.

You will be able to use or play cards to destroy your opponent's cards. These cards does not get recycled in his deck which will make him weaker. When a player's deck run out of cards (excluding the cards into play), the player lose.

Problems that prevent development

The biggest problem so far was how can the cards be used to destroy other components. Should I use a deterministic combat resolution? Should I use combat dice? There also must be enough possible combination to be able to make tons of special abilities.

Attacking with dices could be a good solution. Most of the thinking and strategy would be focused on how can I optimize my bonus and card placement rather than calculating how much you need to kill a card.

News, changes and updates

July 30th, 2010: I recently had new ideas for this game. I got some inspiration from Twilight Stuggle where you play card to influence the board. I intend to use a similar system. Players will play cards according to a tarot like spread in front of him and these cards will allow to interact with the map.

Players will be able to add, move or remove cubes from the board and engage the ennemy in battle. Combat resolution will be done with dices, but there will be an option to play without dices by using the laws of average but you get more brain burning.

Finally, it is possible that players have a very small or no hand. They will draw the top card from their deck and the strategy would be to determine the best place to play this card on the tarot spread according to their objectives. There will be an option to have a bigger hand size but you get more brain burning.

January 11th, 2011: I played a few times ago "51st state" and I was amazed by how they managed to give multiple functions to each card (around 4 functions to each card). I found the game very complex to analyze, but if, in my game, you only have 1 or 2 cards in your hand, it reduces the amount of combination you need to thinks about. So it might not be so bad in the end.

September 6th, 2011: FIrst I had the idea of adding a board to the game. A very simple board where players could control a few areas by placing cubes for marking their forces. The board would be made of diamond tiles where each player could simply connect their tile with the others. Various layout are possible with diamond tiles.

The second idea is to make it a deck building game. The cards would be sorted according to 5 sphere of magic. The player would start with a set of spell cards which could be used for their primary spell effect, or could be use to purchase (research) other spells of the same color to place in their deck.

Players would be able to play their magic cards to enhance their battles or their civilization. The goal is either to captures everybody's covenant or research and cast the spell of mastery if your cards are strong enough.

I was thinking to integrate the deck building idea into my main spell craft game, but I am not sure if it is a good idea.

May 6th, 2012: I had new ideas for this game that I think it might required to split this idea into another one because it has much less relation with the original idea. I played 1812 lately, and I intend to borrow many mechanics from this game. The idea is that each faction will be played by 2 players, 1 warlord and 1 sorcerer. The warlord controls the city production and units, while the sorcerer controls the mana income and can summon creatures.

Each player will have a set of cards made of Strategies and Items OR Spells and creatures according to if you are playing the warlord or the sorcerer. Then players are going to be able to move their troops around like in 1812 and support the battles with their cards. The card system and negotiation between players are the main mechanics borrowed from 1812.

If I still want to keep the idea of tarot cards and spread of the original idea, I could ask the players to play their cards in a spread fashion, but I am not sure. The idea of the spread is that you do not have control on the card played but playing it in different places makes different effects. I don't think that will fit well with idea above. So I'll probably split the pages.

Development Log

Date	Type	Description
15-Jul-2013	Idea	Another idea was to make a transportable solitaire game where you build up something by placing cards, and the card themselves has events that disturb what you have built. The goal is to survive through the deck. It still requires a table to play since card placement is required.
15-Apr-2013	Idea	I was thinking of reusing the titan idea for this game. The card play would represent various installation on your titan, and the cards on the side would represent wounds inflicted to your titan which unlock special effects.

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