When the prototype is too good

In general, a prototype isn’t nearly as nice as a finished product. That may end up not being the case for Rocket Dice. The prototypes shown in the Kickstarter promotions were 3D printed, which produces a much more consistent product than most dice manufacturing processes. Which Game Salute seems only now to be discovering.

There are more consistent dice manufacturing methods. They’re used for Casino dice and precision Backgammon dice. Those come only in six-siders and lack the fanciful shape of the Rocket Dice. They are also very expensive. Gamescience makes precision polyhedral dice, but they’re also more expensive than other polyhedrals. Especially when inked, because they have to be inked by hand. Game Salute says they are committed to deliver the “best dice possible”, but that’s likely to be a lot more expensive than they bargained for.

One thing in Rocket Dice’s favor is that the spur from the molding process could be located in a less obtrusive place than on Gamescience dice.

It will to be interesting to see what happens.

Warhammer Quest

I have been enjoying the Warhammer Quest iOS game. I never played the board game. (I’ve never played the miniatures game either. I did play a fair amount of Fantasy Roleplay first edition.) It has an unusual “action economy”.

During a single turn (that would be a round in D&D), a character can take their full movement, make their full set of melee attacks, make their full set of missile attacks, use all their special abilities, use all items they have readied, and cast spells until they run out of spell points. About the only restriction is that once they make an attack, they can no longer move until the next turn.

Contrast that against Conclave where you get one-and-only-one minor action and one-and-only-one major action each round. Although characters will often have abilities that combine, e.g., movement and and attack into one action.

In practice, this seems to work fine in Warhammer Quest. To me, it begins to feel more like a one minute combat round than AD&D ever did.

3 things about Magic Realm

There are a few things about the Avalon Hill board game, Magic Realm, that have always been inspirational to me. I’ve made a number of stabs at adapting these to an RPG over the years.

Its size/strength/vulnerability/weight scale: Magic Realm measures these qualities on the following scale.

• (N/—) Negligible
• (L) Light
• (M) Medium
• (H) Heavy
• (T) Tremendous

I assume Magic Realm wasn’t the first game to use such an adjective scale, but I’m pretty sure it was the first time I saw such a thing. Similar scales have since been used to good effect in a number of RPGs including Melanda, Marvel Super Heroes, Fudge, and The Ladder, to name a few.

Its combat attacks and maneuvers: Combat in Magic Realm revolves around three attacks and maneuvers.

• Thrust hits charge
• Swing hits dodge
• Smash hits duck

There are a number of complications that make it more than just “rock, paper, scissors”. There’s something very appealing and evocative to me about the attacks and maneuvers.

Magic colors and rituals:

There are five colors of magic, each representing a different sort of spirit that causes a different sort of magic: White magic represents Power from on High, working beneficial magic; Grey magic represents Natural Laws, controlling nature; Gold magic represents Woods Sprites, working elvish magic; Purple magic represents Elemental Energies, twisting and reshaping reality; and Black magic represents Demonic power, working infernal magic.

Then there are eight rituals (represented by chits)...

Type I chits are Righteous invocations, Type II chits are Pagan rites, Type III chits are Elvish lore, Type IV chits are Energy-binding alchemy, Type V chits are Diabolic ceremonies, Type VI chits are Conjuring techniques, Type VII chits are Good Luck knacks and Type VIII chits are Malicious tricks.

RealmSpeak

Something got me to thinking about Magic Realm recently. So, I downloaded RealmSpeak.

In my first three games I was killed by the first denizens encountered everytime. I don’t remember this game being that hard. I guess dad and I must’ve never gotten the rules quite right.

After about a half-a-dozen games, I managed to survive to the end of the game playing the dwarf, though I didn’t have the victory points to win. I managed to get enough victory points to win as the white knight, but I got trapped by the winged demon and killed. (It didn’t help that I didn’t know how to make my hired native follow me and then his contract expired before I renewed it.)

I won my third game playing the white knight.

Formula D

When I first learned about Formula Dé, I immediately dismissed it because dice are used to determine how far a car moves. That is—typically—a bad sign in a racing board game. Then I saw (the now renamed) Formula D on Tabletop. While dice are used to determine how far you move, the die you roll depends on the gear you’re in and each die has a short range of values.

The game seems to have a lot of the spirit of Waddingtons’ Formula 1—for me, the canonical car racing boardgame—while still doing things its own way. Formula D also has the advantages of being “in print”, having two tracks in the box and additional tracks for purchase, and having some more in-depth rules. I can’t say much about that last bit yet, though, since we’ve only played the basic game thus far.