Hey folks,
I made the attached map. There are ten rounds. In each round, there are some randomly preplaced towers in each player's square, everyone starts with 5-30 gold and 0-2 lumber, and everyone has one minute to build a maze from the bottom of the square to the top using blocking towers (1g) and "thunderclap towers" (1g+1l). If a player tries to block, the blocking tower automatically does not get built. (It's really a great anti-blocking system.) At the end of the minute, an invulnerable runner runs the maze, and the game times how long it takes to finish. Whenever the runner gets near a thunderclap tower, the tower triggers and the runner is slowed for five seconds. Whoever has accumulated the most maze-running time by the end of the tenth round wins the game.
I'm really happy with the game as it is, and folks on Battle.net seem to like it, but I have two questions for all the veterans here who are willing to give the game a test run. (You can play it by yourself and it's still fun, I promise :thup
First, do you have any general suggestions to augment the gameplay? Please do not suggest another kind of tower (e.g. poison towers, ice towers, etc.) unless they would actually increase the amount of strategy involved. I want the game pieces to be simple and easy to understand, and I'm not sure more kinds of towers would add enough to the gameplay to justify the additional complexity.
Second, I am considering a "softbatch" mode. Currently, the one-minute time limit is very exacting, and the game does not let you sell towers you have already built or upgrade blocking towers into thunderclap towers. This is good for players who have played before or who like a challenge, but it is admittedly fairly hardcore. I'm wondering if I should add a softbatch mode where you get 1:30 to build, you can sell back towers that turn out to have been poorly placed, and you can upgrade existing blocking towers to thunder towers for 1 lumber. Do you think this is a good idea? And how should it work -- red deciding or players voting (and if voting, which should be the default)?
I made the attached map. There are ten rounds. In each round, there are some randomly preplaced towers in each player's square, everyone starts with 5-30 gold and 0-2 lumber, and everyone has one minute to build a maze from the bottom of the square to the top using blocking towers (1g) and "thunderclap towers" (1g+1l). If a player tries to block, the blocking tower automatically does not get built. (It's really a great anti-blocking system.) At the end of the minute, an invulnerable runner runs the maze, and the game times how long it takes to finish. Whenever the runner gets near a thunderclap tower, the tower triggers and the runner is slowed for five seconds. Whoever has accumulated the most maze-running time by the end of the tenth round wins the game.
I'm really happy with the game as it is, and folks on Battle.net seem to like it, but I have two questions for all the veterans here who are willing to give the game a test run. (You can play it by yourself and it's still fun, I promise :thup
First, do you have any general suggestions to augment the gameplay? Please do not suggest another kind of tower (e.g. poison towers, ice towers, etc.) unless they would actually increase the amount of strategy involved. I want the game pieces to be simple and easy to understand, and I'm not sure more kinds of towers would add enough to the gameplay to justify the additional complexity.
Second, I am considering a "softbatch" mode. Currently, the one-minute time limit is very exacting, and the game does not let you sell towers you have already built or upgrade blocking towers into thunderclap towers. This is good for players who have played before or who like a challenge, but it is admittedly fairly hardcore. I'm wondering if I should add a softbatch mode where you get 1:30 to build, you can sell back towers that turn out to have been poorly placed, and you can upgrade existing blocking towers to thunder towers for 1 lumber. Do you think this is a good idea? And how should it work -- red deciding or players voting (and if voting, which should be the default)?
