Board Game Prototyping

This board game is base on the soccer game in real life. Each player need to control one team of 11 soccer players. The board is divided into 4 areas: frontcourt，midfield1，midfield2，backcourt. Player role dice to pass and shot the soccer ball. Which ever team scores 5 points first wins the game.

Rules:

1: Each player has 10 soccer players and 1 guard.
2: Role dice to start the game(Lower role goes first).
3: Chance to pass:(1/2 change to successfully pass the ball to the next area)
Backcourt to midfield1: 1-6
Backcourt to midfield2: 1-4
Backcourt to frontcourt: 1-2
4: Chance to score:(shooting the ball from the middle has the biggest change to score)
middle: 1-8
middle to left or middle to right: 1-6
far left or far right: 1-4
Chance + 2 if the soccer player is standing in his team’s area.
Chance – 2 if the soccer player is standing with one or more opponent’s player.
5: Chance to guard:
same as shooter’s score chance but role upset number
ex: shooter role 1-6 to score, then guar role 7-12 to guard
6: Defence player can move one soccer player once within the same area.
7: Guarding successfully let the player keep possession.
8: Scoring successfully let the other player keep possession.

A play log:

Very first prototype:

Science there are no grids on our board. We decided the board into 4 areas: frontcourt，midfield1，midfield2，backcourt and we kept that through all the iteration. We started with 3 soccer players and two simple rules: roll dice to pass the ball and roll dice to shot. After one play section, we realize the game was too rng based and needed too little player decision and skill to play. First, we added 7more soccer players to the board which made the game closer to a real-life soccer game. Then we added a player movement mechanic which let you move the soccer player and block the other player’s passing way.

We add a couple of new rules for the soccer player placement:

Each player can put 2-4 players in their backcourt for defense.

Each player can put 2-4 players in their midfield for passing.

Each player can put up to 2 players in their frontcourt for attacking.

The game now requires the player to put their soccer player carefully and more decision making. The game was more fun to play with now but we encounter a new issue. Without a grid is hard to know where to put all those player and keep track of all them was impossible so we added areas.

Those yellow areas and red areas are for the soccer player. We removed the old player placement rule and add the new one: Player place their soccer player into the colored area at the start of the game. When we were testing the game, we quickly realized that one player could take advantage of the other player by slowly put their soccer team. So we change the rule: Player roll dice to start the game. The player with a smaller role starts the first soccer player placement form backcourt his. Then the other player start the same process. Once a player finishes with one area he can’t go back and make changes to the player placement. That way no one has the placement advantage from the dice roll.

After I went home I played this version of the game with my girfiend. As we play, I add more rule for the in-game movement that let the player have more decisions to make. I also added the rule that let player pass the ball over two and more areas. That way players can try to push their luck and win an easy point. She gets rules pretty fast and even wins the game at the end. The simple board game turns out supper fun to play. You can try to play it with a close friend to see if you like it or not.

Core Mechanic:

Dice Rolling:
A game mechanism dice rolling in a game can be used for many things, randomness being the most obvious. This is the core of the game. I try to make a simple and fun game at first so I pick dice. Dice are simple and easy to use. It workes very well with the game so I sicked with it to the end.

Push Your Luck:
Players must decide between settling for existing gains, or risking them all for further rewards. Push-Your-Luck is also known as press-your-luck. Toward the end, I was playing the game and want to bring to the excitement to the game. The first mechanic that came to my mind was “push your luck”. I would never forget the feeling of escape Tokyo with 1 hp left that I played last week with my classmate. I decided to add this mechanic into the game. It fit the game nicely. A player can pass the ball safely with a greater chance of a successful pass and he can also pass the ball to a shooter and take the risk of losing the soccer ball.