Thanks for your comments, Sam.
- You're quite right about Redo for Coasters -- TIP would always be
better. An improvement for Redo would be to roll the movement die
again, and have *both* rolls count -- the first and second. That
could be either better or worse than TIP -- in fact, the TIP value
would be the average expected value for Redo, if done that way. Or,
one could roll twice and add them, forgetting the first roll, making
it more non-obvious when to prefer Redo over TIP.
- You may well be right about Redo for Treehouse too. I have played
Treehouse several times, but not enough to get a feeling of how
unbalancing my proposed Redo would be. One possible tweak would be to
have the player roll again 2 times, but count both Redo and Wild as
blanks. The result would be that 4/9 of the time you'd get 2 actions
in your turn (but not a Wild), 4/9 of the time you'd get 1 non-Wild
action, and 1/9 of the time you'd get 0 actions; that makes 1+1/3
actions per average turn.
This whole chain of thought is spurred by some Icehouse game ideas I
am working on. First, I was using normal D6 dice for movement, then I
thought that D8s really fit better (as I described in the OP), and
finally it occurred to me to have D8 action dice. That worked well
since I was overloading the meanings of the TH die a bit, and 2 extra
die faces allowed me to spread some of the functionality. Then, I
tried retrofitting those basic ideas to TH and MC, with the results as
described. The Redo was mainly meant for rerolling movement dice,
which is hard to fit to Treehouse which lacks them.
Thanks again,
Bryan
On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 12:55 AM, Sam Zitin<sammyz@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Leap is interesting for Treehouse and makes sense. I like your idea
> for it for Coasters as well.
>
> Redo I think I have some issues with. I think allowing someone to go
> twice in Treehouse is likely to be unbalancing, as the other player
> cannot respond with any sort of chance to change the house if one
> player gets too close. As for the Redo in coasters, isn't that
> strictly worse than TIP? (particularly in a game where higher is
> always better) I guess my reasoning for Coasters is that any action
> should POTENTIALLY be worthwhile using a Wild action on. TIP is
> frequently chosen for Wild, I don't think Redo ever would be.
>> .
>> My two new sides for a D8 Treehouse die, along with their meanings for
>> Treehouse and Martian Coasters:
>>
>> LEAP
>>
>> TH: You may move any sideways piece to any other empty spot in the
>> line, without changing its orientation. ("Empty spot" means one
>> between 2 pieces or at either end of the line. You may not Leap onto
>> or under a piece, nor Leap in place -- the practical order of the
>> pieces must change.)
>>
>> MC: You may move to an adjacent square without an arrow pointing
>> there. (I'm not sure whether to allow this just once, or any number
>> of times during your turn.)
>>
>> REDO
>>
>> TH: Roll the TH die 2 more times, and take its actions in order. Any
>> further Redo rolls this turn count as blanks, allowing you to do
>> nothing.
>>
>> MC: You may re-roll the movement die once, before using any movement
>> points; if you do, only the second roll counts.
>>
>> WILD
>>
>> Of course, the Wild side could count as Leap or Redo, as well as Aim,
>> Dig, Hop, Swap and Tip.
>>
>> Reactions?
>>
>> Bryan