Siege



I have spent the last month understanding analogue games then applying what I learned to create a game of my own. For the games we studied we compared Magic the Gathering and Battle Cards and why Magic stuck around. We had a chance to teach the class one of our own favorite games, I choose to show Bid Whist which is now my second favorite card game after...

Siege! is a first of its kind a fully asymmetric 54 card deck game. Either stand ground and become the last man standing as the defense or strategize and scheme your pyrrhic victory through the defense as the offense. 

The games first came from the idea of an asymmetric card game of the dealer going against the field. I then wanted a reason for the field to work together so I went with the idea of an offence vs the defense.


So I then worked on the details on how combat will work. I liked the idea of the Ace, Joker, and the face cards to be something other than values to beat the ten. My first prototype was very limited where the offence's only real option was to attack and the defense was built around the idea of snowballing making the defense unable to combat a rushing offence. I didn't account for the offense stalling and constantly drawing cards so I introduced the rule of once sides draw being the others discard so the offence can only stall when the defense discards a card or loses it in an attack. To further threaten the offense I gave the defense the option to counter attack. Along with refining the combat system and removing the excess rules, I managed to end up with a much shorter rules sheet. Since the function has been ironed out I started to work on the form. To keep in line with other card games I kept the theme abstract along with limiting things other than a card deck required for play.

if I had more time I would fix the issue of understanding and memorizing the rules, mostly through wildling down the options for your turn. My only fix for the issue is a cheap rules sheet. One thing I would love to do if I had the artistic know how is make multiple rethemed decks intended for this game. some ideas would be a French revolution of 3 rebel leaders attacking a lord of a castle or a retheme around naval warfare.

How to Play Siege:

Pre game & summary

  • Necessary materials

    • A full 54 card deck

    • Tokens, die or paper for tracking points

  • Age range 13+

Rules

  • Defense will do an action per player per turn unless stated otherwise {ex: if there are 3 offensive players able to play then defense takes 3 turns}

  • Rules and steps for combat

    • Steps

      1. Highest cards are compared to each other and highest cards are compared first 

      2. spares after the line up can have their value added to any card on their side. {it's the defense choice if they want to combine the value of spare cards}

      3. Higher value wins When there is a tie in comparisons both cards are discarded

      4. If there are survivors go back to step I repeat until all of one sides cards are discarded

      5. when attacking survivors keep going until one side wins then the 

  • Defense cannot look at their files whenever they want

  • If an offensive player is out of cards they are out for the rest of the game

  • Players on offense are able to talk to the table (not just whisper to the other players on their side) but not look at each others hand

  • Some cards are unique (A,J - K and joker) Card descriptions:

Card

Offensive 

Defensive

Ace

Worth 11

Worth 1

Jack

Offense gets to look at the front most file

All offensive players shuffle their hand and show the top 2 cards only to the defense

Cannot be sent into combat if involved in an ambush then the card is worth 1

Queen

+5 value to all cards on her side her buffs will stack and are worth 1 if the queen dies the effect goes with her

King

Instantly trumps the highest card on the other side, After the effect is used it is placed into the discard

Joker

Instantly trumps the other side

Key & definitions

  • File -A single row of the defense

  • Floaters -Defensive cards that aren't locked to a file{suggestion: put a token or have them sideways on a board to tell them apart from your file}

Winning a round and winning the game

  • Defense wins the round if offense fails 5 times the defense receives 1point per surviving file

  • Offense wins the round if they are defeat all files and receive 1 point

  • If an offense player is involved in the defeat of a file then they receive a point

  • First to reach 17 points wins the game {suggestion: use tokens, paper or spin down die(or spin up die in this case) to keep track of points}

Setup

  • First deal 3 groups of five cards the defense will take and out any Kings, Jacks, and Jokers and draw cards to bring the groups back to five cards for each

  • Once the defense has 3 groups of only Aces, 2 - 10, and Queens the defense will pick 3 cards from each groups for a file and organize them in to files

  • Then the defense will draw 3 cards for their hand and deal 5 cards for each offensive player

  • The defense will cut the deck into two groups and place a half to their right as their draw pile and offense discard pile and the other group of cards to the left and will be the defenses discard and offenses draw discarded cards will be placed at the bottom of the group unless stated otherwise

  • Defense will go first

Moves for Offense

  • Attack -Place a card face down in front of the defenses front most file

  • Play a card -Reference card descriptions

  • Draw a card -First discard any card from your hand then pick up

  • Trade cards -Ask the other two players on offense if they are willing to trade if another player is willing to trade then the two players will pass each other the cards face down once the cards have been passed they can be viewed

  • {suggestion: strategize and bicker with your team members before taking your turn}

Moves for Defense 

  • Draw a Card -3 cards are drawn defense can pick 0-2 card from the drawn

  • Play a card -Reference card descriptions

  • Advance a card -Defense has up to 5 floaters that can move to any other file

    • Floaters can advance to a empty file

    • If three cards are on a empty file it becomes an actual file

    • Floaters are part of the defense for an attacked file but can be ignored by offense if they are in an empty file

  • Ambush -Defense can only counter attack on their first turn in a round; after the counterattack it immediately advances to the offense's turn. Defense will pick one card per player able to play from their hand to attack then offense will shuffle their hand and draw the top card for combat

I had a lot of fun working on this game but I did have a hard time finding enough people to playtest. so I had to wait for everyone else to be ready to play test to start refining my game. I did not like the experimental point accumulation grading for this class. but overall like the class and wish I had more time to work on my game

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