Benefits of the Board

Grant Rodiek | October 23, 2012
Post by: Grant Rodiek A friend Tweeted about designing a game with a board and I immediately began thinking about what it means to include a board with your game. I recently went from Farmageddon (cards only) to Empire of York (Cards, Board, Player Reference Boards) and it was a big step up as far as design challenge.
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Co-operative Headache

Grant Rodiek | October 15, 2012
This was a difficult weekend of game design. Or, what, I should say game flailing. Is that a thing? Because if it is, I did it. I've never designed a cooperative game and as a result, there are things I seemingly need to learn from scratch, re-learn, or throwaway from the experiences I've picked up the past few years.
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Personality Disorders

Grant Rodiek | October 13, 2012
If you mention cooperative game design, people come out of the woods to mention that they like co-op, but hate playing with bossy people. Fixing this is the El Dorado of games, apparently. How do you fix the dominant player problem in cooperative games? Honestly, I think the answer is, "You can't.
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Pull the Chit (Together)

Grant Rodiek | October 11, 2012
This post is going to be quite wayward, so let me plot a course for everyone. I'm going to explain what chit pulling is. I'm going to explain my obsession with chit pulling. I'm going to give you a bit of insight into the direction of my new co-op game.
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1901 Mechanic Introduction: Reinforcement and Morale

Grant Rodiek | October 06, 2012
As I design and draft the rules for 1901: Invasion of America, I'd like to slowly introduce and explain the new mechanics. The first mechanics I'm excited about are Reinforcements and Morale. As a teaser, some of the future mechanic articles will be: Creating synergy between the Navy and the Army players (it's a team game, with each teammate focusing on Navy or Army).
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Paper Route: Developing in Real Time

Grant Rodiek | October 03, 2012
Chevee recently released his game Paper Route on The Game Crafter and as a free print-and-play download. I checked out the rules several times and, though I haven't had a chance to download the PNP yet, the game looks excellent and my Twitter feed is abuzz with people saying "Paper Route is fun!"  Post by: Chevee Dodd It all started when Cyrus Kirby (@thefathergeek) challenged me on Twitter.
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1901 Rules Introduction

Grant Rodiek | October 01, 2012
I think it's important to lay out the premise for my new war game. In order for it to make sense, be interesting, and compelling, I need to spend a little more time than usual setting the stage. Here's my first draft.
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A Brief "History" Lesson

Grant Rodiek | September 30, 2012
In junior high, high school, and even college history courses, we spend the majority of our time covering the pivotal events in history. For US History in particular, these include the American Revolution, the Civil War, World War I, World War II, the Cold War, then a final whimper of a chapter that covers the space shuttle and Reagan.
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Building Towards the Target

Grant Rodiek | September 18, 2012
Design pal Jesse Catron prompted me to write about designing a game towards a target audience. What components, themes, complexity levels, and marketing tactics should you use to reach your game's target audience? Challenge accepted! This is a difficult topic for to me to make decisive statements towards.
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Veni, Vidi, Viticulture

Grant Rodiek | September 17, 2012
I'm a huge fan of wine. It's my alcoholic beverage of choice and I've spent many many weekends driving around the vineyards of Napa Valley. I also own a home in Napa, so, yeah, I like wine. This immediately put Viticulture on the radar for me.
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