Firefly Online CCG

POSTED BY: rklenseth
UPDATED: Thursday, June 10, 2004 02:46
VIEWED: 8252
PAGE 2 of 4

PREV PAGE 1 2 3 4 NEXT PAGE

KURUKAMI

Wednesday, January 28, 2004 11:12 PM

Here's a lot of thoughts that popped up over my lunch.

Three options for game victory which occurred to me were the military victory, the reputation victory, and the economic victory.

Military victory: Your ship turns pirate, outfits itself with weapons, and goes hunting the other competitors. Sure, you won't get a great reputation in the transport circles, but once you've eliminated your competition you pretty much control the trade in the sector. Of course, there's always the risk that the Alliance might come and knock you upside the head, you murdering dog...

Reputation victory: Everyone starts out with a certain amount of rep in the business. The more jobs you pull off successfully, the better your rep, and the more likely that big jobs will come your way. Simple jobs would have no minimum rep, and would benefit you substantially when you were starting off. More complicated or serious jobs would only be given to proven crews and vessels -- that is, they'd come with a minimum reputation that you had to meet to earn their trust.

And each job you take would carry some risked rep with it if you didn't successfully complete it. Remember Niska's commentary in "The Train Job"?

Quote:
NISKA
Yes. Good! You have reputation! Malcolm Reynolds gets it done is the talk.

MAL
Well, I'm glad to hear that.

NISKA
You know what is reputation? Is people talking. Is gossip. I also have reputation. And not so pleasant I think you know. Kroll?

KROLL swings open a door to reveal a man hanging by his feet, looking pretty gorram tortured to death.

NISKA
(to MAL)
Now for you, my reputation is not from gossip. You see this man. Eh, he does not do the job. I show what I do him, and now my reputation for you is fact, is solid. You do the train job for me, then you are solid. No more gossip.

Half money now, Kroll give you other half money at rendezvous point. Anything goes wrong, then, your reputation, only gossip, and things between us, not so solid. Yes?

Don't finish a job that you take on, and your rep could seriously suffer. Naturally, there would have to be cards that other players could play to prevent you from automatically completing a job and throw some obstacles in your path.

The better your rep, the more jobs will come to you, until at a certain point you're the big name and every major job will be under your thumb. And of course, the small jobs wouldn't give you much benefit when you're already pretty high in rep.

Quote:
INARA
Right. You're a criminal mastermind. What was the last cargo we snuck past the Alliance to transport?

MAL
We made a perfectly good piece-

INARA
What was the cargo?

MAL
They were dolls!

INARA
They were little geisha dolls with big heads that wobbled!

MAL
People loved those!

INARA
And what exactly was our net profit on the famous wobbly-headed doll caper?

Economic victory:

Quote:
MAL
Whitefall is the safest and the closest. Been a long time since Patience shot me and that was due to a perfectly legitimate conflict of interest. I got no grudge. She owns half that damn moon now. She can afford what we got and she just might need it.

Amass enough credits to buy your own base of operations, thereby controlling the shipping business in the vicinity.

======

Anyways, those are just the three that occurred to me over lunch.

History doesn't always repeat itself. Sometimes it merely shouts "Weren't you listening the first time?!?" and lets fly with a club.

RKLENSETH

Wednesday, January 28, 2004 11:36 PM

Yes, I like those alot, KURUKAMI.

Oh, and play Cantr II at www.cantr.net.

RKLENSETH

Wednesday, January 28, 2004 11:41 PM

How about when you control a planet, like KURUKAMI said, it gives an income until another player takes the planet away from you.

And how about economic victory would work after you come to so many credits instead. Lets say that the first player to reach 500 Credits has an economic victory.

Oh, and play Cantr II at www.cantr.net.

KURUKAMI

Thursday, January 29, 2004 12:25 AM

I am seriously contemplating aiming my ideas at a real-world CCG... kind of weird how the inspiration just leapt almost full-blown into my head.

Are you going in the same direction, or are you focussing on the online version?

History doesn't always repeat itself. Sometimes it merely shouts "Weren't you listening the first time?!?" and lets fly with a club.

TOMANTA

Thursday, January 29, 2004 3:06 AM

As a long time CCG player myself [and one who has played a vast number...], I'd be very interested in this project as well.

Decipher's Star Trek CCG could be mined for ideas as well, especially since it is a 'job'-based game. [I dislike parts of the game and don't think a wholesale ripoff would be the way to go].

Just a few general things... multiple victory conditions, support for more than 2 players, and a variety in cards [Star Wars did an excellent job at this] are all good things.

RKLENSETH

Thursday, January 29, 2004 3:56 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Kurukami:
I am seriously contemplating aiming my ideas at a real-world CCG... kind of weird how the inspiration just leapt almost full-blown into my head.

Are you going in the same direction, or are you focussing on the online version?

History doesn't always repeat itself. Sometimes it merely shouts "Weren't you listening the first time?!?" and lets fly with a club.

That would be something to think about but we would have to buy the rights and such and find someone to sponser the CCG. If the movie does really well (if it ever happens) this could happen.

For now I would be happy to get a free online version to play around with

Oh, and play Cantr II at www.cantr.net.

WYDRAZ

Thursday, January 29, 2004 6:35 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by rklenseth:
How about when you control a planet, like KURUKAMI said, it gives an income until another player takes the planet away from you.

That sounds good. I think planets should be more than that though. Obviously, It should be very tough to 'control' a planet.

Job cards would be drawn at some planets, and if you didn't (or couldn't) take the job, others could travel there to try for it.

You generally need to land on a planet deliver your current cargo/collect payment. The landing player must pay its controller docking fees, or pull Rep (use a Bargaining card, a Stealth Landing card, etc.).

Perhaps an area in the center of the playing field can be the 'map', a grid of connected cards representing locations (mostly planets).

A planet becomes controlled if you buy it from its governor, or beat him (and all his defenses) in combat (which could effect your Rep). Each planet starts under the control of either a random character card, or it's default governor (both uncontrolled/unowned by any player, essentailly an NPC).

Most planets have tremenous defenses and cost more than any beginning player can pay, even after several turns.

Types of cards (?):
Character (Player/NPC?)
Planet (Location)
Event
Job
Item (Device, Weapon, etc.)

Other Game pieces (?):
Money
Player Ships?

Well, those are some of my ideas, anyway.

RKLENSETH

Thursday, January 29, 2004 4:21 PM

Some great ideas. I think this is beginnging to look pretty cool.

Oh, and play Cantr II at www.cantr.net.

KURUKAMI

Thursday, January 29, 2004 4:29 PM

I tossed ideas back and forth last night with my partner in crime, and came to realization that the simpler the game is to grasp (while maintaining the flavor of the series), the better it will succeed.

Each "box" of cards you bought would be a base transport type. Firefly-class, older model Trans-Yu, or whatever. Each class of ship would have varying numbers for four values: Range, Maneuver, Cargo, and Defense.

Range: the farthest you can go for a particular job. Certain jobs will require a longer Range to complete.

Maneuver: your chance to outmaneuver or avoid a combat situation that might arise on a job.

Cargo: how large a cargo can you take on for a particular job

Defense: how well the ship class aids its crew in fighting off combat situations (like, for example, Reavers) that they aren't able to avoid

Cards (and other people have included some of these before) would include categories like:

Jobs
Crew
Actions
Equipment (for Crew)
Ship Upgrades
Contacts
Events

You could only play one Job on each of your turns. That way, players wouldn't be able to job-spam their way to a particular victory too easily. Jobs would be something you'd often have to have a certain amount of Reputation to receive, and if you didn't complete the job you'd lose Reputation.

Actions could be played on either your turn or someone else's -- particularly to throw obstacles into the path of another player looking to complete a job. Naturally, actions could be played in response to actions. For example, if player A tried to play a Job card that would give them a noticeable advantage, player B could play the Action "Compression Coil Burnout" (which prevented the job from being completed on time). Player A could then play the "Timely Maintenance" Action, which counteracted player B's action, and player B could respond with "Parts Shortage" that prevented any one Maintenance card...

... or something like that.

The pair of us are strongly considering dropping the military victory option, for three reasons. First, it doesn't really fit within the Firefly mythos -- that you're just out to make a name for yourself in the grey market trading, even if sometimes you do that through questionable methods. Second, the Alliance would probably come down pretty hard on would-be pirates. Third, going with ship-to-ship combat when each player represents just one ship would mean that it would be waaaaaaay too easy for someone to just get lucky early on in draws and wipe out their competitors quite easily.

History doesn't always repeat itself. Sometimes it merely shouts "Weren't you listening the first time?!?" and lets fly with a club.

KURUKAMI

Thursday, January 29, 2004 4:31 PM

Locations would probably be somewhat limited -- not so much specific planets, more like a class of planets. The Core, where the Alliance is strongest but there are some great jobs. The Rim, where the Alliance is weak but solid jobs are harder to come by and riskier. And the area in between.

Each Job could either be available anywhere, or only in particular areas.

Events would be able to affect one area category, and would last from the time they were played until it was that player's turn again. For example, an Event which told of a shortage of particular goods within a particular galactic area would allow anyone playing a Job focussing on those goods to gain more than they normally would.

History doesn't always repeat itself. Sometimes it merely shouts "Weren't you listening the first time?!?" and lets fly with a club.

PREV PAGE 1 2 3 4 NEXT PAGE