Making our models and future plans for our game board.

Models

For our model we used green stuff to create and sculpt our features on to them.
Green stuff is modeling putty which very useful for adding or filling in gaps on models.
Green stuff doesn't start off green, its two strips of putty which is blue and yellow and once it's mixed together which is ready to mold and sculpt.

A very messy process but it's had some great results.



We started with making arms and legs of our models. This gave us a good feel for how big the model is going to be. Our models were roughly 5.5cm tall. we started by rolling up the yellow and blue strips, once the material had formed together I used water to keep the material soft and ready to mold.
I found this part of our project challenging. Keeping the green stuff soft was a problem. many times i had to start again which became very frustrating but at the same time it's a very good skill to be learning.

While we were creating our models, we discussed possible material ideas for our board game. Joel and Josh who were part of my group thought of the idea of a foam board which would give us the ability to pin items to the foam without any problems. My input was that we should use the foam as base and use a cardboard base as the primary playing board. We all agreed that this would be the best option so went along with this.
After we discussed this we went out to gather items and materials for the our game board. I gathered images to represent our objectives of game, while Josh and Joel collect items which will be crafted to represent the obstacles.

Ludology and Randomiser

Games Dev Blog




Ludology or The study of games was the topic in today's session.

Ludology is about the mechanics in the games. Certain aspects to the game. We looked in particularly in the games randomiser and uncertainty. The random accruing events can be caused by dice where a number is rolled, for example a six sided dice with the numbers 1-6, when the die is rolled there is random chance anyone of these numbers will be the outcome.
Uncertainty event can be related to any card game. After the cards have been shuffle and they are two different decks and during the drawing phase, It's classed as uncertainty. By this I mean each player know what is in the pack of cards but it's uncertain what you're going to draw.



My randomizer

I will be using Dice as my randomiser, my idea will be there will be three turns or phases. First roll will be movement phase where the die will be rolled and what ever number the die lands on will be the amount of spaces your model may move on the board.
Second phase will be the attacking round where the second die will be rolled and the number which the die lands on will be the damage dealt. Then another die will be rolled to see if the attack will penetrate the targets amour or if it the damage will be deflected.
My last turn would be the ability phase. If my character had a unique ability.. were for example if the character had the ability to place traps around the area he was standing. This power would only be available once every 3rd turn and there could only be 2 traps in any area at once. This stops the player from abusing the ability and keeping it fair for his opponents.

The Final Phase.

Creating our game board


                                                                                 

The following week we gathered our materials and items together and created what is going to be our final product.

Shortly after creating the base to our board we decided on what kind layout we should have on our board. We wanted our characters to be able to move in a complete 360 direction, from this we thought of a pentagon pattern. This would be the base of the board where the characters would be free to move to any position which the player wants.




Our idea for our game was a firing range.

We wanted to board to be in a " T " shape where the wider part would be the movement space and where turns and phases would happen.
In the longer section of the board is where our objectives are sat, along with the obstacles. Our aim was the player with most points win, you earned points by defeating the objectives during your turn.
The object were represented by images that were pinned to the foam board underneath.

I took the responsibility for the objectives while my group organised to board and it's set up.



The objectives are scattered on the longer part of the board. To score points you have move you character into a position where you're in line with objectives. You can't hit the objectives if they obstructed by obstacles. Each camp would have a base health of 100 and you gain points defeating each objective.

We came up with the idea that we should have a goal on the board which is greater in reward but has more health than the others but gives out more points if you can successful defeat it.

Feedback and Final thoughts.

The following day after the completion of our game board we're asked to setup

and get ready for our colleagues to test our boards and gives us feedback and constructive criticism.
Perrie Green, Kyle Rodgers and Paul Walters tested our board game and give great feedback and fair criticism. After completing a full game they said that they enjoyed the gameplay and the flow of the game and the idea of having to score points by defeating the enemies.

For the criticism they said that at times the game became very repetitive which could cause boredom. I can understand why this could be a problem, In my opinion we should of introduced and a retaliation system for the enemies where they could take points away from the player which would cause a different action for each turn that is played. They also mentioned that we gave the players to much free movement and could be easily abused. By this they mean how the movement board didn't have any obstacles which blocked their path and it gave the player too much free movement. As a result of this we decided as a group that if we could re-do the board we would introduce walls or blocks onto the movement board, so there is more thinking in your movement phase.

In conclusion I thought that the whole experience went quite well. I enjoyed this project and I think it's a great way to start the year. If we could improve our work it would be making each player have more thought into their turn. Adding obstacles to the map is one good example of this, blocking a players way can make them consider a more tactical approach to the game.
If we had more time to work on our board I would suggest looking more into the enemies on the board. Giving them features and ability to use against the players could change the game play and make it more challenging. As a group we had good communication and great teamwork, working with Josh Stanley and Joel Wilkins was a great experience this my first time working with these two and it's one that i don't regret.
We all gave good input and also we're easy to confront about concerns and ideas.