Subject: Re: MN: Re: RE: Token Stacks and bonuses

From: riffraff@n...
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 14:10:30 -0500

>There is the problem with multi-station stacks: others can easily
>steal Actions. If Garden places a Blue on all zone 1 holy stations he
>can't make the Action until his next Turn, by then some other player
>is likly to be able to reach one of the zone 1 holy stations and steal
>the Action.

Well, why does he have to wait 'till next turn? I can see that a delay
might be necessary for a gambit that only requires one Token, to give other
Players a chance to react, but something like this with tokens at multiple
Stations, the delay involved in getting to all those Stations should be
enough.

--Riff

"This calls for a subtle blend of psychology and extreme violence."
--Vyvyan, "The Young Ones"

---

From: "Snow" <snowl@s...>
Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2000 13:36:33 +0100

Sorry for not saying anything for a while.

> Stations, the delay involved in getting to all those Stations should
be

It was just a suggestion off the top of my head, not something well
thought out. The trouble with not waiting for the next Turn is that
there is no point in having Stack Actions for just one Station. If all
you have to do is put a Token on a Station and then do the Action one
might as well just increase the cost of the Action.

> >Station Landed on Bonus
> >============ ====
> >Termini (zone 3/4/5) Br
> >Interchange Rd
> >Green Gr
> >Mainline Bu
> >Zone x x Bl
>
> Interesting, although shouldn't a Terminus be worth more than a
Bronze?

Maybe, it depends on how easy it is to get there. I was trying to get
something simple and easy to remember. We could have

Termini (zone=3/4/5) <zone> Br

> And what do you mean by 'Mainline'?

I meant BR Stations.

> >Well if we're going to have so many Tokens we should make good use
of
> >them. Token stacks seem like a suitable way to do that, but they
will
> >have to do something better than the current implementation. IMHO
the
> >current system is barely any more useful than charge.
> >
> >I don't think Players should normally be able to pick up Tokens off
a
> >Stack. Nor do I think that Actions paid for should go onto Stacks.
So
> >Tokens would have to be explicitly placed on Stations.
> >
> >You would have to be on the station to do anything. Once the Action
is
> >played all the Tokens vanish and you can't use that Station again
for
> >3 Turns. You can't place the Token(s) and play the Action in the
same
> >Turn.
>
> Interesting...sort of a more useful version of Manoeuvers. I would
suggest
> that, if you can't pick up the Tokens (which I'm not sure I like,
but I'm
> willing to play along for now), you should at least still be able to
shunt
> them - that way you can steal tokens for your own actions by
hockey-pucking
> them onto different stations.

I'm having doubts about what I said now. I still like the idea of a
stacks-manuvers thing, but how to get the Tokens on the stacks and
what to do once they are there is puzzeling me.

The non-adjacent quadrant thing is too messy. Putting Tokens used to
pay for Actions on Stations seem unnatural to me. The trouble with
allowing people to pick up Tokens is that other Players would just go
around picking up your carefully placed Tokens.

Maybe we could just have all stack related action require more than
one Token on more than one Station, that would eliminate the delay
problem. Tokens can only be placed on Stations that the Player
occupies and they can't be picked up (but can be shunted).

I'm still not convinced by my own arguments. Can anyone suggest
something better.

-- Snow
Thank god all that sport has gone, now we can watch Buffy TVS on a
Wednesday afternoon like god intended us to.