Creating a Game (Part 10) - Night Mode (and then some)

Yeah, it didn't take me long, here's the night mode version of the sheet.

This is the bit of game design that I really like, the bit where yu make things look atmospheric and appropriate to the themes you're trying to convey to your players (and maybe a bit pretty as well). 

I've also generated up the trait cards, some of which will be prewritten and ready to go, wile others will be left like this so they can be filled in with concepts appropriate to the story as it unfolds.

The bottom of the trait card has space for a player to place a paperclip. This can be slid along the edge to indicate how long the trait will remain in play. I've also included a circle in the lower right corner of the trait card, where I'm thinking of adding some symbols that might add some extra complexity to the game system for those who prefer a bit more crunch to their games.

I'm still thinking about the best way to do this, but I've got a few ideas in mind.

Some of the gifts in the game might be flavoured according to the type of traits they affect. "Gift A"  might have a basic ability that only affects people, while "Gift B" has a basic ability that only affects equipment. If you've got The advanced version of "Gift A", it might let you use "Gift B" on people. But how do we quickly make this lear without needing people to slow down the game and read fine print. So we come up with some symbols.      

Possible example of a trait symbol that applies only to Scarecrows. One of these proviing a bonus (marked with the "+"), one providing a penalty (marked with the "-"), and one which could go either way (marked with a blank).Like many of the symbols I make for my games, I'm using Game Icons to do this. 

Another idea is playing with the idea that some traits might be more resilient, or more effective in play than others. Players in this game have more agency and ability to control their character's destiny than they do in a lot of games. When traits are affecting a task, players draw a number of cards equal to the numer of traits affecting the task, then they get to apply those cards to the traits. High cards in the game always have better effects than low cards, so it makes a dramtic change to the game if you are forced to placed high or low cards on specific active traits.

  

A high card on a penalty trait has no effect (and is exhausted for the rest of the scene, unless reactivate somehow). A mid-ranked card on a penalty trait means it may give it's penalty but if so, it will be exhausted for the rest of the scene. A low card on a penalty trait causes it's probalem to manifest and the card still lingers as active. Forcing high cards onto specific penalty traits means they are quickly eliminated, but it forces other traits to linger. Forcing low cards onto specific penalty traits means they'll cause their problem consistently.

I can see how the mechanisms of play should affect things like this, but it will probably take some serious playtesting to determine how the psychology of this modifies the play experence. I've had games ideas in the past plenty of times, where the understanding of the theory just didn't match the experience of play.  

The final 

The final idea I've got at the moment would force a player to place a card of a certain suit on a trait, as long as tey had drawn at least one card matching that suit. If you've got a heart aligned trait, and you don't draw a heart then you can put anything there. If you draw a single heart, you have to place it there. If you draw mutliple hearts, you can place any of them on this particular trait. This feels like it has some potential for flavouring certain tyes of action, and by forcing certain types of suit to be placed it automatically makes some traits more suitable for use with certain gifts than others. If you're gift is affiliated with clubs, you probably don't want to be using heart focused traits. 

Again, not really sure, and I might just discard this concept if it starts getting too complex.