Paper Prototype

I switched games that I was working on for the paper prototype, by the second session, so I have 2 records of play sessions. In the first session, it was about a cat trying to defend moon cheese from incoming mice. I initially made this prototype with a more computer based system in mind, and it was hard to play test via paper. This game lasted through about two sessions, before I decided to switch to a different game. This game had a grid based mechanic, where the mouse was to collect all the cheese and has to escape off the map, while the cat has to attack the mouse. In the next session, the mouse was given a speed boost when it gets to the cheese. The mouse moved via dice roll, while the cat could move 4 spots per game. This game was scrapped for a card game.

This game was heavily based off of magical girls, and had a lot of changes to the rules each session. I'm posting a picture of the very first session, as subsequent sessions were hard to see in pictures thanks to the sun setting, and causing a glare. We decided who went first either on a coin toss or a dice roll. You first started with 3 cards, and you drew a card and play a card. The first run of the game had a lot of problems. Your goal was to take out the other opponent's health entirely. Each card was either a spell card with a set amount of mana that it used to cost. Spells ranged from a basic air spell, fire spell, water spell, poison spell, and earth spell. With air and water being on the lower range of cost for mana (being between 1 and 2 mana) and everything else being between 3 and 5 mana. There was usually 2 cards per spell, unless they were more rare spells such as Restoration or a Wand, which boosts your attack and reduces your mana cost for a turn. Some cards even required dice rolls to decide the amount of turns some cards last for. Others require a coin toss based on spell failure rate. Cards the froze the opponent or poisoned them were later changed to use the dice roll mechanic, while the spell failure rate card was based on a coin toss. There were a few cards that would badly affect you as well, which included rotten apples which poisoned you, as well as spell failure rate cards. Health and mana cards were based off of sweet food and drinks, which healed you between 2 and 4 health, as well as 2 and 4 mana. There was also a Restoration spell which cured poison, but did little else in the beginning.

In the beginning, I started everyone out with 50 health and 15 mana. Then I realized that was too high of a number, and we often ran out of mana, as there were too little cards that restored mana. The next session I added a ton more mana cards, and reduced health down to a more manageable 25. I also had to change the poison spells to use less mana as it cost 8 mana to cost, but only lasted for 5 turns. So instead, I reduced it down to 3 mana, and it was based on a dice roll. This session went a lot faster, and didn't drag on as badly as the other one. I also realized the speed boost card, which allows you to use multiple cards in a round, ends up hurting you if you had no mana. The next round, I changed it to where speed boost has anything you use after that cost half the mana it normally would cost. I let you counterattack freeze spells with fire, and changed it where restoration spells cure all bad ailments instead of just curing poison, and also heals you 2 health for a dice roll decided amount of turns. I also ended up scrapping 2 cards as I didn't think they worked. "Hope Monologue" and "Shut Up CounterAttack" as a nod that there's usually someone who is monologuing during a magical girl show, whether it's about hope, or lack of hope. While the other person usually tells them off. They didn't work well as cards. Hope Monologue stunned the other player for 4 turns, or until the "Shut Up" card is played. Said card usually landed in the hands of the person playing it. I also just felt that the card didn't "feel" right. It was a good inside joke, but not good as a card.

One downside to the weekend play session was that my friend isn't much of a gamer at all, and continuously said mechanics were fine when I knew there were still some things off. Although I still learned a lot from it, as each round brought out a ton of changes each time. I learned a lot from both sessions. I initially thought something like a magical girl card game would be easier to play test as I blanked on how to make the cat game better, but there were a lot of things that needed to be changed in the magical girl game, but it was still far from perfect. On Monday, seeing two others play my game, as we were in a group of 3, I learned a lot from that session as well. As sometimes you can't use cards when you're out of cards completely in your hand.