One-Hour Game Design

A year ago, I went to Nanocon and made friends with the illustrious Richard Dansky. On Friday evening, we were between commitments, and we were amused at the Dakota State University game design program’s promotional literature. We also stumbled on some loose dice and game pieces. We decided to make a game in an hour, then playtest it during the rest of the convention. The result is Rush at Zeta Mu Beta. Here are the rules. Enjoy!

Rush At Zeta Mu Beta

A game by Richard Dansky and Chris Sims

It’s rush week at DSU, and the frosh zombies are eager to pledge Zeta Mu Beta. To do so, they’ll need to bring back the Homecoming Princess to their lair at the Computing Center and turn her into one of the living dead. But the Jocks of I Phelta Thi have no use for zombie nerds! They’re dead set on capturing the Zombie Prom Princess, taking her back to the Field House, and giving her a sharp blow to the brainpan. The race is on. May the most ruthless team win!

Players

2 or 4: One zombie and one jock, or a pair of zombies and a pair of jocks. Zombies are on one team. Jocks are on the other.

Supplies

You need a few items to play.

• A board, which is the 16 x 14 map of Dakota State University from the “Super Trojan Master 2” brochure by Kiel “MagicMouse” Mutschelknaus.

• Dice, including one twenty-sided die (d20) and one four-sided die (d4) per player. You also need a pile of six-sided dice (d6) to represent Mysterious Floating Cubes. More on those later.

• Playing pieces, including a chess knight for each player’s playing piece—or a chess knight and chess rook, one for each allied player. You also need a chess queen for each team’s Princess, and a gaggle of chess pawns for Minions. (More on those later.) Each player or team should use playing pieces of differing colors. You can use something other than chess pieces, as long as it’s clear which team and player a given piece belongs to.

Setup

Lay out the board. Players place their playing pieces inside their team’s base. The jock base is the field house (#20). Zombies have their base in the computer lab (#5). Each team places its Princess on the Cloud, which is in the upper left corner of the map and has a princess on it.

The Cloud
The Cloud is for Princesses and losers. You can’t move onto it unless you fall in combat, Further, you can’t grab a Princess to carry her while you and she are on the Cloud.

Playing the Game

Game play is divided into rounds during which each player takes a turn.

• Your goal is to capture the enemy team’s Princess and take her back to your base. Succeed, and your team wins the game.

• At the start of each round, each player rolls a d20. (Reroll ties to determine the order of tied players.) The player who rolls the highest result takes his or her turn first. Then other players take turns in descending order, highest d20 result to lowest result. Once everyone has had a turn during a round, a new round begins.

• On your turn, do the following in order.

1) If you’re on the Cloud, return to your base. See also Mysterious Floating Cubes.

2) Roll a d20. Place the enemy team’s Princess on the board location that has the number corresponding to the roll result.

If this result lands the Princess in a space that an enemy player occupies, then she instead moves to the Cloud for that turn. (Minions aren’t players.)

3) Roll a d4. You have that number of movement points for this turn.

4) Spend your movement points.

The board is divided into blocks and buildings. You must spend 1 movement point to move one block— about the distance equal to the size of the residential block just above the buildings 7 and 8 on the map. Moving into or out of a building also costs you 1 point. You need not spend all your movement points.

Alternative Movement
For more exact movement, each movement point can be spent to move one inch. Make this easy by including a small ruler or marked popsicle stick among your supplies.

If you move into a building or space that contains the enemy team’s Princess, you can pick her up and begin carrying her. See Carrying an Enemy Princess.

If you elect to pick up a Mysterious Floating Cube, you must end your movement to do so. Picking up the Mysterious Floating Cube also ends your turn. You cannot pick up a Mysterious Floating Cube from the same space on your next turn. See Mysterious Floating Cubes.

If you land on a space that an enemy player or Minion occupies, you must engage in combat. See Combat.

Carrying an Enemy Princess

An enemy Princess isn’t too heavy for a jock or zombie, but she struggles and sometimes escapes. Some aspects of the action change while you’re carrying an enemy Princess.

• When you begin carrying an enemy Princess, you lose all but 1 movement point you had remaining, if any.

• You gain 1d4 – 2 movement points per turn, instead of 1d4, with a minimum result of 1.

• If a teammate wishes to begin carrying the enemy Princess from a space you’re carrying the enemy Princess in, you decide whether to relay the Princess to your teammate.

• You can’t pick up Mysterious Floating Cubes.

• At any time, you can choose to release the Princess you’re carrying. She then resumes moving according to the normal turn order.

Mysterious Floating Cubes

Whenever you pick up a Mysterious Floating Cube, grab a d6 from the pile. Keep it until you use it. You can use a Mysterious Floating Cube in the following ways.

• Roll the d6, and add the result to any combat roll.

• Roll the d6, and add or subtract the result from any d20 roll the enemy team makes to move a Princess during the normal turn order.

• Allow your team’s Princess to flee an opposing player who is carrying her. Roll the d6. The result is the number of movement points you can spend to move the enemy player carrying your team’s Princess away from his or her base. At the end of the movement, that player is still carrying your Princess.

• Discard the d6 back to the pile to allow a teammate that starts his or her turn on the Cloud to roll a d20 and reappear on the board location that has the number corresponding to the die roll result rather than in your base.

Combat

Whenever a player moves into a space an enemy player or Minion (see Minions) occupies, they fight. Here’s how.

1) The player who moved into the space (the attacker) chooses a single target.

2) Each team’s members declare if they’re using Mysterious Floating Cubes, and how many. You can’t spend a Mysterious Floating Cube to aid a Minion.

3) The attacker rolls a d20 plus any added Mysterious Floating Cubes, and the defender does the same.

4) The highest result wins. On a tie, reroll until the winner is clear. The losing player is sent to the Cloud. Minions are instead removed from play.

5) The winner places a pawn of his of his or her team’s color on the space to represent a new Minion.

6) If the loser is carrying the Princess, she is freed but remains in that space. She then resumes moving according to the normal turn order.

5) Combat continues until one player remains in the space or Minions from only one team remain in the space.

Minions

Minions are lesser members of your team. They aren’t players, but they can be useful. Here’s how.

• If an enemy player shares a Minion’s space, he or she must engage that Minion in combat.

• If Minions of opposing sides share the same space, they must fight until only one side’s Minions remain.

• Whenever you receive a result of 1 for movement points, you also gain 1 extra movement point that you must spend to move a Minion.

• Minions can’t pick up or use Mysterious Floating Cubes.

• Minions can’t carry a Princess.

Winning

If you deliver the enemy Princess to your base, you win. The game is over.

The Point

I carried on the tradition of quick game concepting, or tried to, by challenging folks to do the same at this past Nanocon. They came up with another game, based on the same board and materials, but about graduating from DSU with the most credits while maintaining a happiness score. Opposing players try to whittle away at your happines.

Like the IP verb challenge I described in my last column, the test of using found materials and a time limit can really focus your creativity. Try it.

While you’re at it, take a little challenge I have up this week on Roll, the Critical-Hits Tumblog. You just might win something. Check it out.