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by M Charles

'Ello. M. Charles, again.

PART 11: O PLAYER BOARD, WHERE ART THOU?

I don't want bloat, false choices, complication, book-keeping, floating modifiers, and analysis paralysis. It's the art of balancing player choice and player desire, within a framework of immersion and streamlined gameplay. Everything is about trade-odds. Am I willing to sacrifice some player choices, complex gameplay, character builds, and meaningful choices for the sake of a more immersive, streamlined experience? Yes -- but how much do I want to sacrifice?

Perfect is the enemy of good; rationalisation is the enemy of streamlined.

In line with my design with a hammer ethos, the core system has finally been given a rough shape. It also feeds directly into the core mechanic -- deck construction. But my deck construction is quite unlike trading card games like Magic: The Gathering. I'm coining the term 'deck constructor' for this sort of game. It features the following:

(1) Intuitive, single-use functions of archetypal cards (i.e. 'Sword'), thereby not requiring any (or much) card text.
(2) Relatively small number (30-50) of cards with a high degree of recycling and retention/reusability, thereby not requiring 200+ unique cards.
(3) My core mechanical system, of interconnected deck construction, with other core mechanics and subsystems (e.g. HP).
(4) Lack of a rarity system, so every card is useful and/or viable, for certain deck builds.
(5) Certain cards are ideal for practically every deck.
(6) You don't lose the game when your deck runs out.
(7) You don't directly fight from your deck, and your deck doesn't contain monster cards or spell cards, or some form of mana or card payment.
(8) Very few cards are upgrades or combo cards, where you must pay other cards in order to play them.
(9) Smaller decks, thereby removing some randomness, and ensuring that you can never take all of the best cards in any given deck.
(10) Unlimited hand size (i.e. Inventory).
(11) Non-fixed turn system, in relation to card-drawing.
(12) Certain cards last forever, or at least until you choose to discard them.

The focus is on RPG and immersive sim elements, a 1:1 mapping in terms of player desires and player options (impossible ratio to reach for every player, but it's always the aim), and making the most of a relatively small number of cards.



The above image is the player board. This is the lifeblood of Red Delve; in fact, it's practically 60% of the game. I'm using 12 cards from Destinies (2021). Let's pause, on that note. How did I come up with the player board?

(1) The fundamental limitation of only using cards from the Destinies base game. You may print off your own, but I wanted them to be directly compatible with cards from this game (since I rather enjoy the art and card stock quality, and the graphic on the backs). (I also believe limitations breed solutions.)

(2) The Shields/Life/HP system from Duel Masters (the trading card game).

I had a few other ideas in the back of my mind, too. I believe they helped a lot. In particular, I was thinking about the Inventory and Equipment system, and the defence/attack bonusses system of RuneScape (MMORPG).

Let's go through the system.

There are 3 card supertypes: HP, Equipment, and Consumables. Note that HP cards aren't used from the Main Deck pool, unlike the other two; and despite the implication, the Inventory (i.e. hand of cards) can simply be placed anywhere near the playing area. The 3 supertypes are split into a few types. See below.

Consumables = Consumables are cards you put in your Main Deck. They are played out of your Inventory. You can only play them once; then discard them. You can play them again if you ever regain them. The most important Consumable -- and one of the most important cards -- is Herbs, since this allows you to Regenerate HP.

HP = Hit Points or Health Points. Inspired by Duel Masters, your HP is tracked simply by 6 cards (face-down). You do not win the cards as a comeback mechanic, however. But you Regenerate HP cards via Herbs (inspired by Resident Evil 4, though many video games and board games use Herbs as a form of Food/Healing). If you run out of HP cards, you die. HP cards are not part of your Library pool of cards.

Armour = Armours are a type of Equipment card. There are 4 of them. You wear them as a kind of protection or defence boost. When you take damage and would ordinarily lose 1 HP card, if there is 1 Equipment card attached (face-up) to said HP card, you lose that Equipment card instead. Only 1 Armour card can be attached to 1 HP card. If you lose all Armour cards, you must play in such a way as to try to get them back from the discard pile, or you must begin losing HP and/or Weapon cards whenever you take damage.

In essence, Armour cards are another layer of HP, but they have two purposes: the first is that they're thematic and add to the immersion. The second is that they take up some of your Main Deck, so they allow for a more flexible HP/defence system: you can take all, none, or some of them in your Main Deck.

Weapons = Weapons are a type of Equipment card, but are far more valuable in most situations. You can dual-Wield them in the two remaining Equipment Slots. But you cannot carry 3 or more Weapons at once, even if you have the Equipment Slots empty. Other Weapons are placed in your Inventory, along with your Consumables and Tools. Wielding a Weapon allows you to use it. At the same time, if you're low on HP and take damage, you must make the difficult decision between losing the Weapon or HP card. If you want to use another Weapon, you must exchange it, from Equipment Slot to Inventory, and vice versa. (Of course, almost always, it's best to never lose the Weapon, unless you plan to switch Weapon Types, anyway; more so, if you know that you can instantly Regenerate HP.)

Inventory = Your Inventory is your hand of cards. You play cards from your Inventory, other than Weapons and Armour. The Inventory is not limited by size; as a result, you really want as many cards in your Inventory as possible.

Tools = Tools are a type of Equipment card. You use them directly from your Inventory. They're like Weapons, in that you can use them any number of times, unlike Consumables, and hold them in your hands. But they don't have defence bonuses, and you don't actually Equip them unlike Armours and Weapons. They have various functions.

Upgraded Weapons = Upgrade Weapon cards are combinational cards, which are more powerful than their individual, separate ingredients. By discarding the base Weapon (from your Inventory or an Equipment Slot) and a secondary ingredient (from your Inventory), you make the Upgraded version of the base Weapon. The Upgraded version of the Weapon must also be in your Inventory at the time.

It's important to get right, and strike the balance between meaningful options, strategies, player freedom/build choices, and streamlining, pacing, and easy-of-use. I wanted it to be as complex as possible, without losing its tightness, streamlining, clarity, and lack of book-keeping, which extends to simply having to spend a long time calculating. Not unrelated to floating modifiers, I'll term this 'floating book-keeping'. Floating book-keeping is subtle but no less important, and centres around the game's feel, complexity, pacing, decision tree, player psychology, component interactions, rules interactions, computational power, brute calculations, and choice comparisons. It can lead to game bloat and lengthy duration if you're not careful.


PART 12: CONSTRUCTING YOUR DECK

The actual deck construction system itself is quite simple at the moment, and untested. I'll just share my rough thoughts at the moment.

You must choose 20 cards for your Main Deck from a pool of 50. This determines your class bias and character composition, and the exact nature of your player board. Do you take Herbs or Crossbow? Do you take Sword or Signet Ring? And so on. Do you want to play melee or ranged combat? Do you want to sneak or be aggressive? Do you want to focus on combat or Quests/exploration? Do you want to focus on HP/Armour or Weapons/Tools or Consumables? Do you want to take a little bit of everything?

Let's pause, again. I believe I've streamlined a very interesting class system with the deck constructor system and player board. Unlike other Roguelikes/Roguelites, where the class/character choice is fixed and predetermined, and unchangeable throughout a run, Red Delve has a very flexible, multifaceted system. Yes, you must decide your class bias before you play, during the deck construction phase -- but since you can take rogue-biased cards, ranged combat cards, and melee-based cards, you can change classes mid-run, in response to the unfolding game state. Some of this is player choice, and some of it is driven by luck.

More on the deck construction side of things later. Still working on it.


PART 13: WHAT ABOUT COMBAT, DECKBUILDING, & OTHER CORE MECHANICS?

At this point, you must be wondering how the combat itself actually works, among other things, in relation to player board and this so-named deck constructor system? My plan was and still is (at least, as of today) to create a twin system:

(1) Deck construction via Weapon cards and otherwise; build a deck before the run, and use those cards to guide your possible options, class bias, and baseline abilities and odds, etc.

(2) Deckbuilding via attack modifier cards (inspired by Gloomhaven), akin to a dice system (where each card has a number written on it), only the attack modifiers allow for much more control, along with a diceless system (at least for this part of the game).

I'm still not ready to detail everything. I'll just end on this: the idea is that you'll have a Sword, for example, from your Main Deck (deck construction phase), and you'll use that to kill enemies. In killing enemies with your Sword, you'll draw attack modifier cards, and you'll have varying degrees of control over the modifier deck throughout the run and depending on a few factors/changes (thereby improving your odds to win the fight). I'll dig deeper into this next time, and also talk about the other core systems and mechanics -- including the rest of the class system/character creation. :)

A new episode has been added to the database: Upcoming Arcs - 2026