Designer Notes ItM #9 - Game balance

We've all run into it before, you're playing a board game with friends and one player is winning so hard, you realize there's no chance for you to catch up and the fun drops off a cliff. The players disengage from the experience and are waiting for it to be over. This is deadly to game design because it breaks the cardinal board game rule: board games are meant to bring fun to the players. They invest their time and money into this product so they can get fun out. So when you're designing a game, it's important to think about the balance, how winning is determined and experienced, and finally potential ways to prevent a run-away leader.

In a few of my blogs I've written generally about game design, but I want to tie it deeper into my experience designing my first game: Into the Mountain. In developing Into the Mountain, I've kept these points in the back of my mind. During my design I placed a lot of value on the game balance. One thing I've learned is to not worry about the balance so much in the early to mid development. I would organize playtesting friends to play multiple games and set their focus on how fair and balanced the game was. But I continued to make changes to the game, so the feedback became somewhat obsolete.

Picture 1. Example of a clan leader from Into the Mountain

I talked about my game's asymmetric factions in blog #7. First off, when a game has factions, there is always some risk of imbalance. Remember, as much as the prototype is playtested, the published version will (hopefully) be played significantly more. That's where I made the clever decision to allow players to acquire the clans during the game. This way, if experienced players discover that one clan is more powerful, it creates competition to pledge to that clan. After the first clan is picked, the others receive a wild resource to compensate a missed opportunity or late decision. I think this design will allow the game to balance itself over time.

There are further methods to balance mechanics like factions. There can be a faction draft system where players choose factions. You can design an auction where players bid resources to get the factions. As I'm writing into more detail on balance I think I can write another blog in the future more on game balance. I still want to touch on two more subjects in the don't let one player win too strong design.

Second, one of my favorite game experiences is "I still had fun even though I didn't win". This feedback means very much to me. I want all players to have enjoyed their time. I think there are several ways to accomplish this. From the perspective of a strategy game, having a low to mid interaction environment where you can't directly destroy your opponents plans can lead to this. FYI: some players just want to see the world burn. Another strategic game design is to have two major sections. The public board and your personal tableau. This allows you to have your own mini-game where you are limited only by the cleverness of your decisions. I'm mentioning these because I intentionally put these into the design of Into the Mountain. Finally, I want players to keep the suspense of not know who wins until the very end. I love games where there's that element of unknown and maybe a surprise at the end. This is an aspect I've been procrastinating including in ItM. I intend to add secret objectives and elaborate on end game scoring. I'm at the same time cautious not to add too many complicated rules.

Picture 2. Dwarven guilds in Into the Mountain

Third, I want to talk about catch-up mechanics. A friend asked me about this in my game and I initially felt I didn't have it and didn't need it. There are major ways to allow players to catch up and minor ways. Part of the design of ItM where this shines is the guilds where player get more dwarves (meeples) shown in picture 2 above. Players unlock further dwarves by meeting the requirement listed on the guild. However, after you've unlocked your first additional dwarf (2nd), then the requirements become more difficult. This deters players snowballing an advantage and running away with the lead. I'm very proud of this mechanic in the design and receive positive feedback from players.

There are further possible ways to allow catching up. I could introduce event cards which punish the player with the most points. I could expand cards to do bonus actions if the players are in last place or not in first.

As with most game design, you will best see the need for balancing and catch-up mechanics by having other players playtest the game! So get your prototype out there and encourage people to play your game. Thanks for reading. Join the facebook group to hear about future blogs or just hit the like button for the blogs.

Keep playing board games,

-Kevin