Niklas Jansson
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Tile Tests
🕑 Added 2023-03-18 16:29:03 +0000 UTCI've done some tile tests. I guess I should be prototyping before drawing assets, but I'm not in the mood for that.
I like deterministic procgen maps, though mechanically they're more difficult to design. Still, I think I've gotten somewhat close. Basically, each unrevealed map block (6x6 tiles) is built from unrevealed stacks of smaller reference cards: Room, Doors, Furniture, Enemies. These can be in four rotated orientations too, so they'll have to be revealed in a consistent manner, i.e. flipped over upward.
Doors are placed only where possible (there is a wall). Then furniture is placed only where possible (some need to be against a wall). Lastly, enemy blips are placed where possible in reading order, from a prepared stack of blips as this needs to be deterministic.
The blips drift around randomly and are revealed upon LoS, becoming an Ork, Skeleton, etc, though some are just harmless vermin that can be ignored/removed. There could be minor and major blips giving the player some tactical challenges.
The side walls with doors between blocks could be big segments for that 3D feel, or just regular door stand-ups. I realised that these need to go between the tile blocks (an unrevealed block should still reveal its connecting doors).
Not sure how big the map should be, but perhaps 3x3 blocks is a realistic limit asset-wise, meaning I probably need to draw at least 9 blocks. I don't know if this style is working yet.
The difficulty of the game could be controlled by prepping the stacks with different tier things.
Deterministic hidden placed floor traps is more difficult. I guess they could be made using blips and plenty of false blips but it might clutter the floor. The player could walk around, waste time disarming, or take a chance by stepping onto. Or, traps could be associated with the loot-able furniture. The order of any loot cards must also be deterministic of course. Perhaps a card/chit could simply be placed under the furniture. Unfortunately these would have to be small and can't contain art and rules; they'd have to be references to a rules paragraph. Not very immersive. I could just use random chance, e.g. a roll (I don't like linear card draws out of principle)... there's also the enemy drops to deal with, and that could get messy.
There's also different tiers of furniture such as barrels, treasure chests and shrines.
Speaking of furniture, I thought about the Diablo shrine and sarcophagus and had to draw those (and also a floor texture). Diablo started out as a TBS game. I think it would work well as a HeroQuest game.
I also drew some more character. Included a sheet I drew in the past with a slightly different mindset.
Comments
Niklas Jansson
I worked on a different tiling "engine" a while back which worked a bit like Tetris. Perhaps I'll make a post about it. As for this technique... I think even if it doesn't work well I can repurpose it. I think its main advantage is that it's quite compact on the table and won't nudge. Even if disturbed perhaps it can be reconstructed from the smaller build stacks. In a way those works as a save. I wonder if the game can even be put away as long as the card stacks are not disturbed. We've got cameras now for that I suppose. I might print out the game in micro format for testing so I don't waste toner.
oidoid
Thanks for sharing. It's really neat for me to see your tiling concepts in this boardgame context. I'm working on a top-down videogame right now and thinking about what makes for good tiling. My game engine is custom and I have a ton of flexibility to use arbitrary non-tile sizing where I want to but I've found that I really miss the inherent rhythm of more conventional tiles when I stray from them. Tiles just feel more cohesive. I keep coming back to your Fester's Quest remake especially (which I find to be such a bizarre and alluring but simple game). I was so surprised you halved the avatar size! It was just so unexpected to me when I first saw it. It feels like a micro-world and somehow the characters have all the more charm for it, kind of like the overworld view in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. (I think the filename and tank allude to this.) I can't decide what I think about how the tank and buildings have explicit perspective but the Uncle Fester avatar doesn't so much due to the sizing (more of a profile view for the character itself with a perspective shadow). I love how simple it all is because I feel it gives me these tiny little characters (that have real character!). The detail strikes the right balance between allowing my imagination to add whatever I want but yet it feels so nicely done and so put together. However, I can't help but think of that TMNT overworld because those turtles really do have perspective but then you miss out on some of the other details that are more interesting. Tradeoffs! A bit tangential but I recently stumbled upon this micro-boardgame concept called Wander. Maybe you would like it. The concept delights me and I think this 41 second video sums up that excitement well: https://twitter.com/NateTreme/status/1579481065693278210 . Here's a link to the cards in the video: https://natetreme.com/blog/2019/6/5/wander-a-business-card-rpg I suppose all that was pretty roundabout but really nice to see the tiles!
Florian Wortmann
This gets me hyped up so good😍😍😍
