Engine builders are among my favourite types of board game, so its no surprise I put this mechanic front and centre in Undergrowth.
Before getting stuck into this topic there are a few terms which I use repeatedly that it's important to understand.
Assets - these are game components, e.g. cards, tiles, tokens etc from which players gain resources to build an engine.
Effects - these are actions, gains or capabilities offered by playing assets.
Activation - the act of resolving effects.
Payouts - these are repeated moments in the game when a player's assets has are activated, offering gains in resources.
Setup - establishing your engine.
One of the most satisfying aspects of a great board game experience for me is making strategic or tactical decisions early in a game which pay dividends later. In engine-building lingo this is sometimes referred to as 'the setup' and involves building a system of assets (cards, abilities, effects) which will offer future payouts at certain points throughout the game. This is referred to as an engine because if you make the right decisions (and get lucky at the right times) the benefits become somewhat automantic and self-sustaining. Engines can just tick over, providing players with a regular trickle of rewards which keep them going, or they can have multiplying effects on resources, capabilities or just cold hard cash! Whatever style of engine a game has, it is rewarding to see your early-game judgements about what cards to play, what resources to gain or positions to occupy pay you back as the game progresses. If your 'setup' is poor, it can also make a game hard work, but that's the joy of board games.
The engine room (so to speak) of the engine-building mechanic in Undergrowth is the card tableau each player builds throughout the game. Your tableau is your gang and includes characters (Dwellers) as well as tools, locations and energy, but mostly characters. Getting the engine callibrated right on these cards so that players could construct a gang which paid out through the game was one of the trickiest design elements and getting the engine purring taught me whole load about the role that systems play in engine-building, and board games design more generally. So, if you're interested in learning a bit about what makes a good engine and how to deisgn one, buckle up, we're going full throttle!
Lesson 1: Establish a system
Probably the most important lesson about building an engine-builder is the need to establish a system. In order for players to make streategic or tactical decisions about how to build their engines they require fixed points of reference around which to strategise. The three key points of reference in most cases will be
the engine assets (cards, locations, components etc)
the type of benefit (immediate, ongoing, end game)
the mechanism for periodic payouts
Fixed points of reference such as these provide players with the information they need and the regularity to confidently anticipate, plan ahead, change tactics if necessary and make choices in game-play. Knowing which assets give you engine building benefits and knowing the fixed points during the game when they will give additional payouts (or the mechanism driving payouts, if they don't come at regular points) is essential because this enables players to activiate their 'if this.../then that...' conditional reasoning, which is central to strategic decision making.
In Undergrowth, the system looks a bit like this:
Certain cards, like the Miner, the Diver and the Shovel below, give immediate effects when played into your tableau. Every effect indicated by a lightening flash is immediate. However, there are certain points in the game when immediate effects are also reactivated, meaning that having received a payout when they first played a card, players receive the same payout from each immediate effect at future points in the game.
These set points are dictated by the Weasel King Journey Track, which is effectively the round counter. As the Weasel King marker moves through the steps on the track different effects are activated. In rounds 5 and 8 immediate effects are reactivated.
These fixed reactivation points enable players to strategise around known payout moments. These payouts occur simultaneously for everyone, allowing players to be tactical about which cards to play, and therefore which resources to gain, at different points according to their strategy.
Alongside these fixed payout points, there are also two asymmetrical reactivation points. Once again these are dictated by positions on a track, this time the Renown Track, however this time the payouts occur when players reach certain points on the track, so are different for everyone.
When a player's Renown cube reaches points 5 and 16 on the Renown Track their immediate effects are reactivated. However, unlike the fixed point payouts of the Weasel King Track, on this track payouts happen as and when players reach the relevant points. This means that not all players will necessarily get all four payouts.
This combination of fixed and variable reactivation points enables players to be both strategic and tactical, planning ahead for fixed payouts and controlling the timing of variable ones.
Having effects which payout at different points in the game enables players to think carefully about what they need during the beginning, middle and end of a game. They can also decide what benefits they may want to be activiated periodically and which they want available to them throughout the game. Establishing a system of immediate, ongoing, periodic payout and engame benefits provides a reliable framework for players to strategise about their engines and get them up and running.
Ongoing card effects are permanent once a card is played (for example the Diver gives a player a permanent diving helmet) and are indicated by the infinity icon. End-game effects are indicated by an omega icon and all require a card combo. This means you only get the payout if you also have the corresponding combo card in your tableau.
Lesson 2: Calibrating payouts correctly
A large part of designing a successful board game, particularly one with strategic elements, is calibrating a range of factos and variables so that they function and integrate well during gameplay. This means that the various assets needed to establish and build an engine at the beginning, middle and end of a game are available in sufficient quantity at the right times in the game. It also means getting the cost of such assets just right so that things you need early in the game are affordable and things you need later on are more costly. When it comes to engine-building, calibration is really important. Factors worth considering when calibrating an engine include:
1. The availability of different effects. This refers to the proportion of immediate, ongoing and endgame effects available to players (ie, the proportion of each type of cards in a deck). If they're too abundant and readily available then the 'setup' is less satisfying. If they're too scarce then establishing your engine and getting it ticking over becomes to hard.
2. The cost of getting those effects. This matters because the assets you need to get your engine going in the first 3rd of a game need to be affordable (in terms of currency cost or movement cost or resource cost). At the same time, assets players want in the final 3rd of a game to boost their engines mustn't be too 'cheap' or there's no satisfaction in building an engine towards eventually affording them.
3. How many points at which effects are reactivated. This is important because it determines how many times after the engine 'setup' a player will get a payout from their engine. It also makes it necessary for players to ghet their setup established in time to benefit from the first payout. These are often referred to a Production Phase and typically occur between two and four times in your average strategy board game. As described above, in Undergrowth, payouts occur on four occasions through the game, two at fixed moments and two at variable moments.
4. When those points occur in the game. Deciding exactly when engine payouts (or Production Phases) should occur really matters. Too early and players may not have got their engines set up, too late and there may not be enough time or rounds left to do it more than once. An interesting question for designers is whether all players should get engine payouts simultaneously or not. In Everdell, players move into Production Phases when they are ready. In Underwater Cities, play pauses for the Production Phases so all players reap their payouts simultaneously. Undergrowth , with its mixture of fixed and variable Production Phases, includes a mixture of these approaches.
5. The availability of different value assets at different points in the game. This has to be carefully calibrated to produce a well-balanced engine-builder game. If in the first 3rd of a game there is an over-abundance of assets which are not of much use and a scarcity of useful assets, players will struggle to establish their engines. Generating resources which can't be used is pointless and frustrating. It can be challenging to calibrate card decks so that the right assets and resources are available at the right times. Some games get around this by having different decks for different stages of the game. Underwater Cities is a good example of this. Each deck is calibrated for its corresponding phase so that it contains benefits appropriate to that phase. In Undergrowth there is just one card deck and a lot of play testing has gone into getting just the right ratios of cards with early, mid and late game benefits. One way if achieving this was to have cards with multiple benefits, useful at different game stages.
Lesson 3: Strategic engine-building choices
A lot of the fun of an engine-builder is making decisions about which parts of your engine to build and when. Are you going to set up your engine to payout a little bit of everything, or focus strategically on assets, such as money, types of resources or capabilities? Maybe you'll begin focussing on one type of asset then switch to another. Whilst most games have certain assets players cannot do without (or certainly can't win without), it is common, particularly in games which offer multiple routes to victory, for players to be able to decide what sort of engine they want to build based on what sort of strategy they're using. One advantage of this approach is that all players are not trying to do the same things at the same time throughout the game, which can make for a more interesting and varied game. It also enhances replayability, since a player might apply different strategies each time they play.
In Undergrowth, players need to collect a variety of available treasures (gold & quartz) as well as food for energy to keep building capabilities, unlock new tunnellers and pay card costs. A range of cards give treasure as effects which payout later in the game, as described above. However, players also have a number of other strategic options:
Green Man Blessing strategy - take blessings from the Gods to activate payouts and gain permanent benefits.
Renown strategy - prioritise climbing the Renown Track to gain a range of immediate and permanent benefits. Players gain renown from a range of in-game achievements, such as moving down a level in the tunnels or winning a duel, but also by making worker placement choices or playing certain character cards into their tableau.
The silver amulet in the top right corner of the Local Hero card represents Renown. Wherever it appears, Renown is on offer.
Card strategy - build an engine which enables you to draw more and more cards.
A number of cards increase your hand drawing capacity. The greater the turnover of cards in your hand, the better chance you stand of building the most beneficial and high scoring gang tableau. Since the largest proportion of your end score comes from your gang tableau, it's no bad thing to build a strong one!
Lesson 4: Taking something and turning it into something else.
This is a central element of many engine-building games, though not prominent in Undergrowth. The principle here is that not all resources are readily available, particularly early in a game, but can only be gained by converting other, more readily available resources, or by unlocking new capabilities. It's the 'need this to gain that' approach.
The closest mechanism to this in Undergrowth is the Alchemmist card. Because gold nuggets are more abundant in the deeper tunnels, they are harder to come by. But with the Alchemist, you can convert the more abundant iron ore and quartz crystals to gold nuggets simply by storing them on the card then placing a tunneller to retrieve. You can see the Alchemist here, burning the midnight oil, converting your treasure to gold!
Once a player has advanced to point 12 on the Renown Track the Alchemist conversion ratios become more favourable, 1 quartz or 1 iron ore = 1 gold.
OK, we're getting to the end of this post. Let's just summarise a few important things about engine building.
Creating a system with consistency around which players can strategise and plan ahead is vital.
Having various engine building options so that players can change tactics mid-game if necessary is also a strength.
Calibrating costs/benefits, frequency and mechanisms for engine payouts is vital. (Play test, play test, play test)
OK folks, that's all for this entry. As always, please feel free to comment or ask questions below and hit the socials to learn more about Undergrowth and Knight's Games.