Game Mechani(sm) of the Week #31: Lego Dice

http://games.lego.com/en-GB/kids/default.aspx

So much potential, so little time.

I was introduced to these through a thread on Story Games.

It was interesting that the concept appeared not long after my Brisbane iGod comrade, Andrew Smith was telling me about playing rudimentary wargaming with lego and dice (I think it was with his nephew). It's the kind of concept that Lego is really doing well lately, tapping into the zeitgeist and giving us the toys we want.

But I'm really interested in the potential that comes from dice where you can adjust the faces modularly, mid-game.

The first thing that came to mind was the dice used in the Alkemy miniatures game. That game uses a variety of coloured dice each with different facing scores depending on their colour, and different dice are used depending on the degrees of damage suffered by the warriors.

But modular lego dice offer even more potential, faces can be modified on the fly based on temporary bonuses. Effects can be applied for different colours (maybe if you roll a green, you get a bonus if you're using a nature spell...if you roll a colour applying to some specific ability of your opponent, you might apply a penalty to them). Once you apply modular colours and variable numbers to a single die, the potential is phenomenal.

I can't wait to get my hands on some of these to test some theories and play out some concepts.

But this gives me some ideas for another mechanism (for tomorrow's post...)

Comments

Andrew Smith said…
Even though the Lego wargaming with my nephew is just "both roll a d6, lowest roll loses a minifig" I should point out a slightly (only slightly) more detailed Lego wargame called Brick Battles, from Blank Shield Press. The basic rule is no different, but it has modifiers for all the nice extras that you can add with Lego. Find it here: http://www.blankshieldpress.com/brick.html
Friday, 07 August, 2009
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Guide to Geomorphs (Part 7)

Image
A working computer and scanner...that means it is time to get back to work on the geomorph sequence. A lot of the discussion in this set of tutorials has been focused around square geomorphs. They're the easiest for most people to wrap their heads around.  But my preferred form of geomorph is based around the hexagon, these tend to produce more organic and interesting shapes. This is true for natural environments, but it's no less true for urban environments. The example set of geomorphs above as a simple two-phase system. One edge type is plain, the other edge type has a road piercing the centre. There could be dozens of combinations and permutations for each of the two phases around the hexagonal edges, but a quick look at the variety of buildings and road shapes shows that there could literally be hundreds of possible options when drawing these map fragments. But you certainly don't need to create hundreds of designs for the system to be effective. Usin...
Read more

A Guide to Geomorphs (Part 1)

Image
After numerous requests to get back to map tutorials, it's time to start our new series. This time focusing on the concept of geomorphs, modular map fragments that can be mixed and matched. We'll start with a couple of theoretical tutorials before sinking into a few more practical posts. I'm predicting a dozen or so posts in this sequence, but let's see how long it lasts.
Read more