Session Report: The Evolution of Warcage

Introduction:
Warcage is a grid-based war game where a player moves units around the grid in order to try to eliminate the enemies forces. The game is over when either player eliminates the enemy hero. The combat of the game is determined by a combination of dice rolling and card playing, giving the game a unique chance based element with the opportunity for strategic twists. Each player has 4 units (a hero, a warrior, a tank, and a horseman), and a deck of cards. The cards are labeled with single attributes: attack, defense, parry, or boost. Each unit also gains a small boost based off its type. Warriors get +1 Attack, Tanks get +1 Defense, Heroes get +1 Attack and Defense, and Horsemen cannot be Parried.

Fig 1: The drafted rules.

Session 1: Initial game testing
For the first session the rules started off very simple: eliminate the enemy hero. Both players placed 4 units onto the field in the back two rows at each end of the board. We rolled a dice to determine who went first. The first two turns of the game seemed very slow because the units started too far away from each other to initiate combat immediately. After consideration, we decided to keep the game this way in order to allow for strategic maneuverability for the first two turns. The next phase of the game introduced the combat, which was fun but very unbalanced. The initial style of combat we had was based off of 4 card types: attack, defense, agility, and bluff. The attack and defense made a lot of sense together: the damage dealt to a unit was the different between the attack and defense values. With the dice roll determining the total damage, we calculated that the maximum damage dealt from a single dice would be 5 (max roll of 6 minus the minimum roll of 1). Because of this we made each units base health 5 hit points, so there would be a small probability of killing the enemy in one blow. Although the maximum damage by one dice would 5, we determined combat would be decided by 2 dice per player, allowing for more combinations of cards to be played. Also, each unit would apply a bonus to the rolls: warriors would get +1 attack, tanks would get +1 defense, horsemen would get +1 agility, and heroes would get +1 of each.

Fig 2: Day 1 Gameboard

Fig 3: Day 1 Combat

However, we ran into our first problem here. The "Agility" mechanic was a multiplier to either attack or defense, allowing some rolls to be significantly higher than others. The "bluff" mechanic also proved to be frustrating in this sense, because with poor luck, the battle could swing in favor of the enemy way too quickly. The reliance on luck was further increased by the small hand size of 3, limiting the options of each player. Lastly, each players deck had 10 of each of this cards, making poor luck cause you to draw multiple bluffs and very few defense and attack. Warcage was extremely fun still, but after this session I decided to revamp some of the combat to try and make it a little more balanced.

Session 2: Revised Testing
During session two, I tested with a friend who does not play video or board games in order to see how interesting the game could be to pick up and play. After session 1, I revised the rules a little. "Agility" no longer was a multiplier, but instead treated as a tiebreaker. Also, I changed the amount of cards in the deck, to 13 "attack" cards, 13 "defense" cards, 7 "Agility" cards and 7 "Bluff" cards. I hoped this would provide less bad hands and more hands with playable strategies. When the game started, the first two turns played out similarly, slowly but with strategic unit advancement across the board. When the combat initiated, the game was very different. It was no longer a one-attack blowout and instead required strategic placement of units with flanking and pincer placement (trapping single enemy units). This game was much more enjoyable, and usually ended with one player trapping the other in the corner.

Fig 4: Day 2 strategic unit placement

After this play session, it was determined that "Agility" still didn't work as it should, and that "bluff" cards forced too much luck on the combat. However, the new deck breakdown made the draws more consistent and more enjoyable. There were much fewer times when we felt our hands were worthless, and more times where playing cards took more thought than just luck. After this session I decided to completely scrap "bluff" and "agility" in favor of two new abilities, which I would then test with a third partner

Session 3: Final Testing
On Monday, I paired up with my third partner in order to test the updated rules of my game. This time "bluff" and "agility" were replaced with 2 new types: "parry" and "boost". The parry mechanic would counteract any opponents dice roll of equal value, giving the defender a needed boost when behind, but not putting the attacker at a huge advantage for lucky rolls. The "boost" mechanic merged the units with the combat better. It provided a flat bonus to each units type bonus already existing. This change also meant that the horseman's' bonus would have to change. In order to keep the stats linear, the horseman's new ability became "cannot be parried". This unique ability allows for parry and boost cards to still be played as bluffs during the horseman's turn, but not be wasted other turns.

Fig 5: Day 3 unit placement.

After testing one game with my partner, we decided that the "parry" and the "boost" mechanics were extremely fun and made our game hectic and got us both to the edge of our seats. However, after a short discussion we decided to try a game with a hand size of 5, to allow for more combinations. This change was by far the most significant, because it allowed for us to have way more options on both offense and defense, and caused for some of the most intense dice rolling yet. With these final rules, Warcage became the game it set out to be: an epic war game with tense combat, big damage swings, epic counter attacks, and a fun experience.