----- Original Message -----
From: "Kristin Looney" <kristin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Icehouse] What about Volcano?
First, there is the 11th color of pyramids we just made. The fine folks
at KLON just made a whole bunch of little opaque grey pyramids! Our mold
makes 3 pyramids at a time, one of each size - and we had them cut off
just the smalls, and grind up the other two sizes and the runners and toss
them back into the mold again.
What? I would have though they could just block off the large and medium
parts of the mold. Well they're the experts.
Over and over again. Until we had 5000 little grey pyramids - which will
make 1000 copies of a new little product called 'Volcano Caps'. (The
last time through the mold, we kept the medium and large grey pyramids -
so we will also have full stashes of grey pyramids coming out soon as a
Dangling Carrot exclusive.)
I don't suppose you could just stick one grey pyramid in each Treehouse set,
could you? What, you don't think 5 larges, 5 mediums, 6 smalls and a d6 fit
in a tube? Well let me lay some pixels on ya:
http://www.ryanker.com/Looney/IMG_0529.JPG
If Treehouse were to come with the extra cap then it wouldn't be
unreasonable to expect the consumer to make their own board. But if you're
going to make a Volcano completer set, then I think it's kinda cheesy to NOT
include a board too. ("You already bought five Treehouse sets -- now this
Volcano Caps product will give you everything you need to play Volcano...
except the board.")
If someone gets only one Treehouse set, what could they do with a single
Volcano cap? I suppose it could be used as a turn marker. If you buy three
sets to play Binary Homeworlds, then you can use one of them as the turn
marker.
Another random thought:
Has it been decided whether Treehouse dice will have numbers, either alone
or with the Treehouse actions? If so, you should see if you can get the
dice in a variety of colors. If someone is going to get five Treehouses in
order to play Volcano, the dice might as well be the right colors to play
Blockade too.
What would be REALLY cool for Blockade dice would be two dice that each have
one cool color and one warm color, so that both players can use the same two
dice. One could be red/green marbled and the other blue/yellow marbled.
(something like...
http://www.unclesgames.com/product_info.php?ref=3&products_id=7696&affiliate_banner_id=1
only more evenly divided between the two colors.)
And lastly...
IF IT WERE ME, I would stagger the introduction of the Rainbow and Xeno
Treehouse sets. Why? There's been a bit of talk about convincing consumers
to buy multiple sets (2House, 3House). But if they misunderstand and get
two Rainbows and one Xeno (for the sake of variety) they're basically
screwed. Sure, they can play Martian Chess (even for four), but Binary
Homeworlds and three-player IceTowers are out of reach. Besides, the Binary
Homeworlds rules specifically mention absolute colors. Not only do you have
to get three of the same set, but you need three _Rainbow_ sets to play that
"correctly". Better to limit the people's choices so they're less apt to
make a choice that would leave a bad taste in their mouths.
Heck, I'd even keep the Xeno set in the same available-but-invisible
distribution channels as the single-color stashes and leave the Rainbow set
to be the flagship product that gets sent to stores. Yes, make Rainbow
"the" Treehouse set and make Xeno "the other" Treehouse set.
Ryan
