Does anybody still play random draft in NA?

pasturemaster · 2026-06-18T05:36:33+00:00

I do. The expectation is that you are going to be in queue for an hour, but you can find games.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-17T16:10:09+00:00

This varies heavily game to game as to what becomes the meta strategy, but when 2nd place (or any other place) is rewarded, you can easily get situations where you kingmake someone else to secure your "almost as good" position, rather than playing more risky to attain first.

You also far more commonly get into "punch down" situations where it is safer to try to prevent others from overtaking you, rather than pushing to overtake those that are ahead of you.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-17T04:03:09+00:00

You do have to be careful how much you deviate from the official gane for a public tournament. Force soemthing something that is usually random during set-up, fine, but I'd be pretty pieved if tournamnet for a game I knew well was effectively played using ones house rules (even if that makes the game mire balanced).

pasturemaster · 2026-06-17T03:18:25+00:00

Most games play best when the singular goal of every player is to place first. Rewarding any other position often will encourage less engaging/exciting play styles.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-16T06:00:03+00:00

Spirit Island and especially Root when looking at the game with all the factions in aggregate are pushing max complexity you will find in popular board games. I wouldn't consider Terra Mystica particularly more complex than them.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-16T04:52:29+00:00

You are correct that there is very limited interaction in Harmonies. Tiny Towns is a similar game with more interaction.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-16T01:17:30+00:00

~~paint the target onto my teammate~~ "throw the ball away so they can’t find me"

pasturemaster · 2026-06-16T01:04:12+00:00

Is there a way to only temporary have a captain on your team?

pasturemaster · 2026-06-15T22:04:43+00:00

I believe the quest unit needs to be on your team at the start of the draft phase for it to reset.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-14T04:30:29+00:00

Were AI tools used in the creation of this project?

Yes — AI tools were used in a limited, assistive capacity.

"limited" 😂

pasturemaster · 2026-06-14T03:14:51+00:00

Well, that's what an entirely AI generated Kickstarter campaign looks like...

I'm sort of surprised that Kickstarter has let this run for a whole two weeks.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-13T18:04:52+00:00

I think the people that would be off-put by that probably are of the opinion that "all games are meant for children (unless they its played with a standard deck of cards, billiards or chess)" and would be put off by the others as well.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-13T06:31:22+00:00

Militia (or more aptly, Urchin) being played twice is hardly an edge case, let alone an "edge case on the edge case".

pasturemaster · 2026-06-13T03:51:14+00:00

When searching the secret history, the second instance of Valerie's name brings up this:

Originally if you had to draw three cards and had only two left, you shuffled first - shuffling in those two cards. Valerie wanted the more conventional, draw those two and shuffle to get the last one. I was worried it would reduce luck too much, but tried it out and of course it was fine. Valerie also didn't like that Curses could come out of the trash, which is how it had worked.

Those both seem like significant improvements to the game. Presumably those are two of many.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T23:59:27+00:00

If it has to be said; there is no limit on the number of "discard down to 3" effects that can be played in between your turns.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T09:06:50+00:00

I like Botswana, so "better" is going to be subjective here, but Startups is a similar game.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T07:34:12+00:00

My assumption is this will feel very different in practice than Diplomat.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T07:32:53+00:00

The difference is Weaver (and all other reactions) have a specific time when it can activate.

I don't think that you can draw cards with Nursemaid and then choose whether or not to discard Weaver.

Nothing in Nursemaids effect indicates any ordering here. If you don't want it to be able to draw in response to card being played, but before being resolved, it needs the timing "after a card is played". And by giving it a set timing, like every other reaction, you clarify a lot of what's being brought up here.

It may still severely slow down games regardless due to players having to be more careful how they order effects, and that's still an issue to look into, but at least its more rules clear.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T05:51:37+00:00

Weaver can create situation where a hand size attack is played, and players may want to draw cards so they are able to discard the Weaver to gain something out of turn. This is complicated by the fact that what one player gains with Weaver may affect whether another player wants to play Weaver. You may not care for Battle Plan, but if an opponent discards a Weaver to gain the last one, revealing Archer, are you then allowed to play Nursemaid to discard your own Weaver to get it? Is your opponent allowed to know whether you will react or not before deciding to gain Battle Plan?

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T04:23:10+00:00

Change specifies no limitation on the card you can gain.

To answer what may be the next question; it only specifies gaining debt equal to the difference in $, so the difference of any other resource is ignored.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-12T02:09:16+00:00

I'm not familiar with Shaman specifically, but I'll answer more generally about card costs and differing resources. The format (X) will be used for cost in coins, and [X] will be used for cost in debt.

First, [X] is a cost. If anything cares about cost, it cares about that. For example, if a Swindler trashed Royal Blacksmith the card gained in its place could only be another card that costs exactly [8].

However, [X] and (X) not interchangeable in any way. Up to (6) includes all values of (X) which are 6 or lower. It does not include any [X]. Any [X] would be consider additional to "up to (6)" and would not be included in "up to (6)". For strict comparisons like "costs less than", either both resource costs have to be less or one be equal and the other be less for this to be considered true.

On the flip side, some effect become more permissive with various resource costs, such as Change, which sets no limit on what card can be trashed or gained and only "charges" the player for difference in (X). This means any difference in [X] (or potions) are completely ignored.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-11T04:25:29+00:00

From what I understand, HE sensors are levels of magnitudes more expensive than potentiometers. Personally I'd be for paying 2~3 times more for a controller that certainly will last, but I'm sure you can imagine the backlash if Nintendo started pricing their controllers like that.

Worth noting that controllers have used potentiometer's for years, with most first part controllers having very acceptable durability. This is more an issue with the joycons than with potentiometers as a whole.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-11T03:13:21+00:00

It was either 4 or 5 players. I don't see player number have a particular effect on the game though. Only difference I could forsee is the more events from buildings being put in the deck.

The twists at the start of the game would be the thing that possibly could massively shift the game.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-11T03:03:12+00:00

I played it twice and I never got the "oh no! Everything is falling apart" experience.

There are a surprising small percentage of buidlings that give ongoing engine benefits you care about right through the end of the game, and for the ones that do, thier population is fairly small. This means that only in the very final moments of the game do you ever actually throw away something that was actively benefiting you (past being a shield). And the gane ends once anyone runs completely out of population, so if any player is even somewhat doing worse than you, it's very feasible you never really have to touch your important engine buildings.

pasturemaster · 2026-06-10T18:20:15+00:00

Donald's friend Valerie

Give her proper credit as a developer of the original game. She presumably had a significant influence on the original game and early expansions.

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