Board 8 > Tabletop/card game idea- what do you lot reckon of this?

(+) Yeah! (+)

It's still kind of a mess of random elements at the moment, but I think it's cool.

The tentative title is Oh No, Brain Slugs. Players take on the role of a starship crew attempting to make it through a hostile sector of space, but they're under constant threat from the Brain Slugs, mind-controlling parasites who can turn some of the crew against their fellow players.

At the start of each round, one player is designated the Captain, and they draw a Mission card. This will tell the players how many of each type of resource they need to try and accumulate, and the penalty for failing, and possibly some extra restrictions. The Captain then draws a number of cards from the main deck to create the Mission Deck, which is then passed around the players in turn. Each player can either remove one card from the mission deck, or add a card from their hand. Some cards are good, and accumulate resources. Others are bad, and cost resources. At the end of each mission, the first player (the Captain) resolves all the cards in the mission deck. If they meet the requirements, they get a bonus. If they fail, they get a penalty. The Captaincy is then passed to the next player in turn, and the process repeats.

In addition to the mission resources, there are three persistent resources, also gained (or lost) via mission cards and bonuses/penalties from mission results- Morale, Hull and Fuel. If Morale or Hull drop to 0, the ship is destroyed and the crew loses. If, at the end of a mission, Fuel is over a certain number, the Captain can make the ship jump to the next system. After compleing a set number of jumps, the crew wins.

Here's where the Brain Slugs come in. At some points, either as the result of a bad card in the mission deck or a failed mission, the crew can be attacked by brain slugs. When this happens, each player is given a card from the Attack deck, which contains a number of cards equal to the number of players plus one- most of them say Safe, while the last one indicates that you've been taken over by a brain slug. If you get this card, then for the rest of the game, you're working against the other players, and you win if the ship is destroyed.

That's kind of the basics. It needs a lot of balancing work, but do you think it's got potential?
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a lot of games with players secretly working against other players have become popular lately. I think the idea has some potential. I'd recommend adding some ability for the non-infected players to try and punish the slugs. if the slugs are just working to destroy the ship and can't be targeted or interfered with in any way this probably makes them too strong and gives them no reason to keep their identity a secret.

if there's some kind of anti-slug procedure this adds a new dynamic to the game. the slugs need to keep their identity a secret while working against the rest of the ship. and, potentially, you can manipulate other players to turn the anti-slug procedures against healthy crew members.
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Sounds like a new take on the hidden agenda gametype.

I like it a lot.
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MariaTaylor posted...

a lot of games with players secretly working against other players have become popular lately. I think the idea has some potential. I'd recommend adding some ability for the non-infected players to try and punish the slugs. if the slugs are just working to destroy the ship and can't be targeted or interfered with in any way this probably makes them too strong and gives them no reason to keep their identity a secret.

if there's some kind of anti-slug procedure this adds a new dynamic to the game. the slugs need to keep their identity a secret while working against the rest of the ship. and, potentially, you can manipulate other players to turn the anti-slug procedures against healthy crew members.

Yeah, that's the bit I'm trying to come up with at the moment. I'm thinking maybe the Captain gets to pick one or more players to leave out of the mission, but I don't want a situation where one player gets left out of most of the game. Maybe if excluding a player lowered Morale- enough of a hit that it's not worth doing if you get a low-risk mission, but low enough that you can afford to drop a few suspect players when it really matters... but that would then mean a slug-infested captain could spend a bunch of Morale to sink the game. Needs work.

EDIT: New idea- Weapon cards. These would be in the mission deck, and whenever one resolves, get added to the Armoury, which would remain in the middle of the table. At the beginning of a mission, before passing the cards, the Captain can choose to use any of the cards in the armoury, which would have effects like excluding a player from the mission, forcing a player to reveal their hand before playing, making a player discard and redraw their hand, etc. Punishing suspected traitors is therefore still a resource that has to be earned and spent wisely, but wasting it isn't catastrophic for the loyal crew.

Also, I realise I forgot to specify 'secretly' to the bit about players adding and removing cards. All the other players will know about your turn is whether you added or removed, they can't see (and you can't say) what the card in question was.
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have you looked up or tried shadows over camelot?

it sounds a little similar in that a group of players are working together to accomplish some objectives, but there are between 0 and 1 secret traitors
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I've played plenty of traitor games. The board game group I go to has some serious trust issues.
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Well, one way to help avoid captains taking over would be to have a medical officer who can relieve a suspected captain. Or possibly a way to vote out a captain.
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this sounds vaguely like the battlestar galactica board game
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Yeah I was just about to say this sounds really similar to Battlestar Galactica
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Lopen posted...

Yeah I was just about to say this sounds really similar to Battlestar Galactica

this.

different board gamers like different games, but my favorite games in this vein are the ones with zero bells and whistles - only the deduction of who is good and bad

infecting players is a dangerous idea IMO - you can mess with the incentives so that people want to become infected and change to the stronger team or whatever.

aside from BSG, you might want to check out 'panic station,' which literally explores the idea of a parasite. the one time i played, the parasites won by infecting all of the good guys.
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