While on holidays, I played that old (bought in the 80's) board game called Fief. After several games I wanted to point at the good and bad things about this game in order to find some general rule.

Fief - Board Strategy Game

Fief - Board Strategy Game

Some assets of the game are innovative and worth mentioning.

The resources are really limited. It is common to have limited number of soldiers or houses, but the limitations are often relative to a player. In this game, there is a limited amount of money. After several rounds, there's no money left in the bank and people cannot earn their income. This opens the possibility to organize bankruptcy.

Movement design is clever. The only way to move your army from town to town are Lords. They are special soldiers that can walk 2 towns a round. While moving, they are able to carry any amount of soldiers with them. Once they are well positioned, the Lords allow you to move around the map really fast.

    However, that's not a perfect game, the main problem could be summarized with the statement "10 pages rules book". Here are some consequences of that fact.

    • Many rules leads to contradictions and unclear statements
    • The learning curve is disastrous
    • More time spent reading and discussing the rules than playing the game

    In order to find a solution, we are going to analyze some facts and get general rules off them.

    Could we play without this rule? Yes. Drop it.

    In the game, there are 2 types of building that gives resources: Mill [cost 300, give 200] and Press [cost 200, give 100]. Basically, you first buy all the Mills and when there are no left you start taking Presses. These two buildings are just about the same, do not give any kind of reflexion but have to be learned by the players. Removing one building would not affect the decision range of the user and would make the game easier to play.

    Ten things doing slightly different things? Merge them!

    There are lots of cards but you can never use them. There are offensive cards and their respective defensive cards. Offensive cards are targeted against a player and aren't that common. No need to say that you never have the defensive card when needed. That's about the same for cards that gives money, you either have to be Clergy, have a Fief or be King to use them. Since most of the time you are nothing, these cards are trash. Being given useless card over useless card is a really bad feeling.

    A solution would be to transform these useless cards would be to make them generic. What about having a rare card that can counter any offensive attack. As for the money card, it would give money based on the highest rank you have. By changing how to attribute the cards, we could keep the same usage rate. They would be seen like a great reward and as a side effect simplify the game.

    Simple rules, great flexibility.

    The methodology adopted by the game is: "There's a problem? Add a special rule for this exact problem". What if we let the user the possibility to do it anyway? It will give flexibility and make the game easier to understand! For further thoughts about this philosophy in the web development, i would suggest you to read the free book Getting Real.

    Random Posts

    • Guild Recruitement – Search Optimizations (0 Comments) -- December 24, 2009

      In World of Raids Guild Recruitment Tool, we wanted the search to be instant! We achieved this goal by not having a single page refresh or ajax call while updating the settings. Since it runs in the browser, performance was a real concern. We will see in this article what were the tricks used to mak...

    • Project – Cineartistes (0 Comments) -- August 4, 2009

      Philippe Pelletier has been gathering information of people working on the cinema industry for years as a hobby. He realized that people could be interested in his work and he could share it over the internet. The website Cineartistes.com is a database of biographies and filmographies of acto...

    • Project – MMO-Champion Optimization (0 Comments) -- August 4, 2009

      MMO-Champion is the biggest news website of World of Warcraft. The main page is viewed millions times a month and was done with old school tables. As a result, it was really slow to load but worse, all the content had to be loaded before being displayed. The first thing I did was to rewrite t...

    • Project – Shortest Path (0 Comments) -- August 4, 2009

      A school project was to find the shortest path in a dungeon graph. You start with an amount of hit points, and each edge gives or removes hit points. You have to find the path from two points going through the minimum of edges (no matter their value) alive (hp > 0 all along the path). The difficulty...

    • MySQL – Select Previous/Next Entries (0 Comments) -- October 30, 2009

      In SQL, this is a common issue to query the previous and next entries of the database. In order to achieve this, we are going to use a table that is sorted by the `id` field. To get the previous, the technique consists in sorting all the fields that are lower that the current one and taking the firs...

    Trackback

    3 comments until now

    1. 72]Free Ringtones!

      http://fastloannow.ru/ringtones/ringtones-13.jpg

      72]Download Ringtones!

      ringtones credit card required
      samsung music ringtone
      beyonce halo mp3 ringtone free
      real free metropcs ringtones
      squirtgun ringtone
      the ringtone 633 squadron
      cheap no sign up free ringtones
      heywood banks ring tones
      longest time ringtone
      free sagem my x2 polyphonic ringtones

      Free Download Mobile Ringtones
      Free Thousand Foot Krutch Ringtones
      Duke Ringtones
      Chev Chelios Ring Tone
      Hovnanian Homes Mid Atlantic
      Mid Sussex Golf Club
      Adda Midi To Ebay
      This Love Of Mine Midi File
      Re Max Mid Peninsula Mary Roach
      Realtones For The 3 Mobiles
      Mobile Ringtones For Phillips Phones
      Nokia 6010 Polyphonic Ringtones
      Iphone Ring Tones Do Not Work
      Toten Hosen Alex Mid
      Samsung A300 Polyphonic Ringtones
      Free T Moblie Ringtones
      Converting Mmf To Mp3
      Kenton Midi
      Old Tv Showe Ring Tones Sprint
      Using Itunes Ringtones On Other Phones
      Tier Laute Ring Tones
      Juke Mp3 Ringtones
      Animal Midi Files
      Realtone Poetable Tape Recorder
      Indian Polyphonic Ringtones
      Free Transformer Realtones Ringtones
      Boat Hire Canal Du Midi
      Create Ringtone Software
      Real Ringtones Telus
      Free Ringtones 3gforfree
      2012 Ring Tones
      Midi Guitar Loops Free
      Undertones Midi Files
      Meeting Ring Tone
      Callback Tones For Alltel
      Worship Midi Loops
      Lady Madonna Midi
      Converting Midi To Cd Audio File
      Korean Midi
      Portland Mid Century Homes
      Ringtone Fillet Of Fish
      Polyponic Tones
      Free Ringtone For Lg G4015
      Lotro Midi
      Ringtones To Download For Free
      Goodbye Horses Ringtones
      Toxic Polyphonic Ringtone
      Cell Free Mole Phone Ringtone Virgin
      Mmf At Risk
      Anterior Mid Pole
      Rabbids And Ringtone
      Free Nokia Ringtones Mono
      Free Alltel Cellular Phone Ringtone
      T809 Ringtones
      Free Stallionaires Ringtones
      Fishing In Mid July
      Country Midi Files 1960

      free polyphonic ringtones ringtones
      ringtones nascar
      how to make ringtone
      free ringtones for vx6000
      ringtone for g600
      free brooks dunn ring tones
      ringtone sounds free
      motorola v300 free ring tones
      popcorn ringtone for lg cu70
      scary movie 4 ringtones
      jonas brothers mp3 free ringtones
      free ring tones for the dash
      usb data cable for ringtones i860
      basic ring tones for cell phones
      zelda theme ringtone default
      ringtones for siemens cf62t
      ringtones windows mobile
      free star trek ringtones amp logos
      sony 20ericsson polyphonic ringtones
      free polyphonic downloadable ringtones mmf format
      dont matter ringtone
      nextel custom ring tones
      tmobile sidekick ringtone cingular wireless

    2. 72]!!! PORNO !!!

      http://harizzzma.com/pornpics/an104.jpg http://harizzzma.com/pornpics/an146.jpg
      http://harizzzma.com/pornpics/an75.jpg http://harizzzma.com/pornpics/an141.jpg
      http://harizzzma.com/pornpics/an102.jpg http://harizzzma.com/pornpics/an199.jpg

      72]!!! ENTER !!!

      жесткая порно видео эротика
      порно шоубизнеса
      лижит клитор
      порево фильм
      секс со знаменитостями фото
      порно фотки смотреть
      сиськи тины
      позы тантрического секса
      секс порно эротика видео безплатно
      часное порно фото

      Порно попки blog
      Юные голые азиатки
      Смотреть порно онлайн лесбиянки
      Скачать платное порно
      Секс книги скачать бесплатно
      Порно толстых ролики
      Секс с собакой видео скачать
      Онлайн фильмы порнуха
      Частное порно студенток
      Порно с яной студилиной
      Бесплатная оргия
      Порно мужчина смотреть
      Женская мастурбация видео
      Порно фильм полнометражные
      Первый секс девственница
      Www порнуха ru journal
      Увеличение пениса
      Бдсм фильмы онлайн
      Tv порно journal
      Женщина хочет секса
      Порно видео анны
      Порно клипы
      Российского порно фото blogs
      Порно фото молоденькие
      Целков
      Волосатые вагины онлайн
      Секс порно онлайн
      Лена беркова порно фото
      Www секс
      Скачать видео геи
      Порно jn line
      Бесплатная порнуха
      Толстые секс порно
      Секс порнуха blog
      Гола маша
      Гей видео
      Секс видео чат онлайн
      Порево онлайн без смс
      Порно видео подростков
      Бесплатное порно смотреть онлайн лесбиянок
      Смотреть порно видео лесбиянок
      Часное порно видео
      Порно попки фото
      Голые девушки порно
      Секс геи фото
      Смотреть порно целки
      Видео порно
      Женщины порно бесплатно
      Бдсм видео new topic
      Самое лучшее порно видео
      Гей парни порно видео
      Маленькие голые азиатки
      Секси видео посмотреть бесплатно
      Геи полнометражные фильмы
      Порно фото маленьких девочек
      Порно фото яны
      Голая юля волкова
      Японское порно скачать
      Скачать порно видео инцест
      Бдсм смотреть онлайн бесплатно
      Как доставить женщине оргазм
      Смотреть эротику онлайн
      Русские порно ролики смотреть

      секс фото без порно
      секс домашнее порно
      порно флешь
      секс голенькие мальчики
      секс душ
      первый секс советы
      оральный секс сверху
      секс икино
      порно аральный секс
      вагинит секс
      каталог порно сайтов
      porno nurse
      порно ганг
      котлас секс
      жёсткий секс порно
      каталог секс сайтов
      порнуха кони
      гей секс плешка порно
      порно фото анал фистинг
      публичный секс порно

    3. В школе на уроке мира перед детьми выступает Сталин. Видя, что от его
      речи школьники начинают клевать носом, он решил сменить монолог на
      диалог:
      - У кого-нибудь из вас есть ко мне вопросы?
      Тут встает Петя Иванов и говорит:
      - У меня к вам три вопроса:
      1) кто убил товарища Кирова?
      2) почему люди в стране такие нищие?
      3) почему в стране постоянно нарушаются права человека?
      Сталин чувствует, что его прошибает холодный пот, но тут звенит звонок и
      дети стремглав выбегают из класса. В начале следующего урока Сталин
      опять спрашивает:
      - У кого-нибудь еще есть ко мне вопросы?
      Вовочка:
      - У меня к вам пять вопросов:
      1) кто убил товарища Кирова?
      2) почему люди в стране такие нищие?
      3) почему в стране постоянно нарушаются права человека?
      4) почему звонок прозвенел на 20 минут раньше?
      5) где Петя Иванов?

      Корпорация Мегаполиса Pi7.ru порадовала новым выходом очередного сборника нюансов.
      Меня удивила скажем это "Домашний фото сет (14 фото) " - Канечно вы можете найти и ради себя много интерестного
      Ну а однако лучшее снадобье от скуки это анекдотец.
      http://www.my.pi7.ru/images/photos/medium/dbbb27432c5bab1cb117e22152b55787.jpg

    Add your comment now