So, my original solo play plan was to have ALL the character roles be present in a single deck, but with all the hero cards in play - so 5 cards, 1 deck. The single deck used stripped down versions of each role deck, but were combined so that the player could use all the roles for a balanced 'run' and have a fun experience. The 'support deck variant' for sotm is a pretty fun way to play that game solo, but you still have to manage two heroes. Rudy drew attention to the sotm variant, and it suddenly got me thinking that it could fit, or be a central piece, of the less than 5 player experience, which I assume MOST games of TPK will be.
I don't think it varies much from my original concept of using the most powerful and sort of essential cards from each role deck and combining them into a single deck for soloing. The downside was that in that plan the 'low and slow' building sort of abilities were going to be cut in favor of the more straight forward abilities "heal for 5", "attack for 10", and so on.
Using the idea of a support deck, means you use at least two decks every game, where one deck is the full character experience, and then the support deck is the paired back version of all the other roles you chose not to play with. 1 player, = 1 role deck, and 1 deck with 4 other roles combined. 2 players = each with one deck, and 1 deck with 3 other roles combined, etc. The problem with then be with 4 players, the 5th deck is just a full deck sitting there.
Or maybe the support deck has NOTHING to do with the existing role decks? Those decks always will be complete decks, and the support deck is pulled from a totally different set of cards, depending on how many players, and what roles, are in play. Hmmmm, I think I like that idea even better....
I'm liking the idea of the "raid" or "support" deck being filled out by variants on the normal class deck cards. So while let's say the Cleric player deck has SMITE which does 2 damage and Light Heal which heals 3, the "cleric support" cards might heal more and do more damage, only because since there isn't a dedicated cleric in those games, you might need more bang for your buck when those cards do come out.
ReplyDeleteI think we need to start grinding out cards and games to see what works, because it's probably going to take a lot of fine tuning.
Pulling this out of my ass, and I think it's terribly clever.
ReplyDeleteSupport Deck
Each character has a set of 10 support cards. Depending on the number of roles in the game, the remaining roles should add their support cards to the support deck. The support cards will feature the art of the supporting character, and also hopefully retain some of the 'character' of that deck as well. The number of character decks in the game determines how many support cards are pulled each turn. So, 1 player, 40 card support deck, 4 cards per turn. 4 players, 10 card support deck, 1 card per turn.
Agree about the increased potency per card.
Ok, that sounds pretty cool. Now, if you're playing solo, and 4 support cards are drawn each turn, do you choose one of those cards to play, or do you play all 4 cards as well as whatever you played yourself? It sounds like you're playing all of the cards since only 1 is coming out in a 4 player game. Another consideration can be you have the 'option' of playing one or more of the support cards that have come out that turn. I'm still just reading about LOTR Card Game, but it sounds like cards have costs to play, so I wonder if you're imagining something like that, or as in SOTM where you can "play a card THEN play a power" etc.
ReplyDelete