The Legend of Dev Diary: The Diary Begins

The old 'gun fight in an elevator' gag never wears thin.

 

You should totally try a sight-blocking terrain type(s). You could use the same sort of idea to do rooms with closed doors. If it doesn't work right away, put it on the content update wish list.

Your party stands on the stained flagstones of the ancient arena. Having defeated the craven goblins in front of the roaring crowd, two portals now loom before you. Will you choose the Lady, or the Tiger?

 

Well, I did say try.

Exploration is a big part of the dungeon crawl experience for me. I accept your reservations, though. I'm approaching this very much from an RPG background, so I tend to overlook concerns particular to card & board games.

 

I'm with mightymushroom on the feel of this. The idea that there might be something around the corner that you don't know about, holding a sharp bit of iron is something ingrained in RPGs, I think.

 

Hidden things do sort of exist in board games as well--not placing all the pieces until an event triggers them, or hiding what is truly there (al la Stratego). I personally would think it advantageous for a computer board game to be able to implement something like fog of war if it wanted to, even if a real board game could not. Its similar to the advantage computers give to allow Card Hunter to have an otherwise unwieldy library of hundreds of enemies, items, and cards at our fingertips. Or to make complicated rules resolutions flow in a snap.

 

But that's the same as seeing that Orc Warrior #1 has a 'Flaming Sword' - the first time it's a surprise, the next time(s) not so much.

 

Semi-random spawns could be a possibility. Likewise, once you search 100% of a map, maybe it could be an award to have the map be clear for all your future plays. That would also make it interesting for when you think you've seen it all on a board, but still havent unlocked the map.

 

I'm now thinking of scanner "blips" in Space Hulk. The Genestealer player must have tokens on the board in order to physically move something around, but the Marine player won't know the exact composition of enemy forces until he/she gets a visual on the blips.

Might be another possibility, though it wouldn't have as much of an in-game explanation for this fantasy world.

Also, as to exploration: don't forget that each module is itself a series of different boards. You don't know for sure what's behind "the door" each time you go to a new board. There might even be random variation in the boards, or diverging board sequences, if the creators feel like it.

 

That's basically how Claustrophobia handles it. Basically the "dungeon" is a series of tiles that are, in most cases, randomly laid out as you explore. So until you go down a particular path, there is no way any player would know what's in store.

 

I thought you were the skeleton minion. Just like how sokolov is, personally, Cactuar.

A Bear is a bear, what's the problem?

 

I can verify this.