Titanomachina Features & Benefits: Oodles of Tension

I recently read an article, transcribed discussion really, about randomness that summarized a fair bit of what I've learned about randomness since I started designing Titanomachina in 2011. In particular the bits about Chess touched something of a sore-spot, perhaps because they touch on what I've tried to do with Titanomachina. The notion is that in Chess, and similar games, you have complete information about the board and so instead of there being the emotional experience of dealing with risk you're merely trying to out-smart the other player(s) in a 'battle of wits.' A lovely little book by Kenneth Binmore named "A Very Short Guide to Game Theory" addresses this notion of a battle of wits between players in his chapter on Chance in games. Of course, Professor Binmore's emphasis is on the mathematical details, but I think a conclusion can be drawn regarding the emotional or experiential details of combinatorial games where it seems like everything is laid out on the table in front of the players. Players can manage the risks of thrown dice and shuffled cards, or they can manage the risk of the player opposing them not playing in the way expected of them; there's an element of randomness to other players that can have just as much tension as a throw of the dice. 

The fact is that while we may be able to read the board state of Chess and mechanically extrapolate the best move from that state, the human experience of playing Chess is one of feeling your way around the board, hoping your opponent doesn't have a counter for what you're trying to accomplish, and hoping your instinct for the best move is better than theirs. I mean, yes, you can calculate your way through Chess, but the best Chess players train their instincts and their feelings, so that those feelings don't overwhelm their instincts and calculative abilities. There is a tension to Chess and other combinatorial games that I don't think is there for games like Warhammer where players have additional randomness throw in to level the playing field or to mix up the experience for players intent on socializing and drinking. 

Titanomachina does have randomness on top of that provided by the players, although nearly everything can be narrowed down to player choice: The players have cards in hand, the faces of which are hidden from their opponents, preventing players from having perfect information of the game. That would be input-randomness, but players are supposed to arrange their Titan decks in the order that they want to play the cards in the game, in the sense that they're supposed to program their Titan's actions for maximal effect. But while players draw cards into their hand following a strict order defined by the deck, they can play the cards in hand in any order they want. Where players draw five cards a turn, and conceivably play all of them, their opponents only have a probabilistic idea of what their opponent is going to play next. Certain cards are designed to be played before or after others, for combination effects, so it's not like these odds are equal either; some cards are more likely to be played than others considering the conditions on the board, the number of cards in hand, and the last card that was played. 

To further complicate things some cards have options, enabling a Titan to do one of two actions, so while a player may have five cards in hand they can have up to ten options to play. Players can also control the set-up of their buildings and Titans on the board, and the set-up of their Titans prior to the game (limited in Tabletop Simulator, I know, but I'm working on it). 

Furthermore players know what they each want to accomplish: Destroy enemy building and Titan systems. They know how much time they have to accomplish that, which is 18 rounds. They know what systems that the other Titan has and where the other Titan is on the board at all times. Each game is about players building intricate engines of victory, just like in a traditional euro engine-building game, but with the flavour, tension, and story of a narrative "dudes on a map" game. 

The reason I took the dice out of the game was because after all the effort of trying to set up an attack, the chance of it falling flat due to the dice was a major mood killer. Rolling for initiative had the issue of ties, which are a hassle, and using the initiative cards gave it gave just enough uncertainty to affect strategies, while opening up space for the story-telling utility of the personality cards. This uncertainty mainly affects timing, as the question is not whether you'll hit or do damage or whatever, but when, and whether you'll be able to mitigate incoming attacks by doing so: there's a real question of whether you want the best shot or the first shot. And that question of what your opponent is going to do next, and what they're building towards develops a wonderful tension and excitement. 

In between games too, there's the engagement found in Warhammer and similar games where players can consider at their leisure just how well the material they brought to the game served them, and how well they applied it.