With the last revision of the rules I had three areas of the game that I wanted to simplify:
- The Stances
- The Temple and the Cat mechanics
- The Protein tiles (again!)
I have now tested the new rules quite a bit, including a full playtest with three players with my physical prototype. The changes to the stances, the protein tiles and the Cat mechanics works well. Overall, the game rules felt simpler and more intuitive.
The one change I was not happy with was the new simplified mechanics for the Temple. Something were lost along the way. The Tempe did not feel unique or fun. The playtesters had some great ideas that I have tested out by myself and tweaked during the week.
We also noticed another issue – it is quite tough to get back into the game if you lose your last energy dice. I’ve implemented some smaller changes to address this as well.
Change #1: Temple Overhaul
In the Temple you can now prepare sacred food to gain powerful actions. For each level you ascend in the Temple more recipes are unlocked. At the first level there are three recipes. Also, at level 2 and 3 you may offer one of the sacred foods to the deities to score points. Each food may only be offered once (except for the simplest food at level 1) so there is a bit of a race to get to the highest scoring foods first. You place a lotus flower of your color on the food you offer. Later, if a player uses that food’s action then you will be rewarded with one Protein.
This mechanic is not as simple as the previous simplified version. But the overall rules for the Temple, the Cat and the Rise stance is still much more streamlined that a few months ago. And I believe the sacred foods will feel very unique for the Temple and offer interesting choices for the players. I am very excited to try this out with more players!
Change #2: Easier to Get Back After Losing a Dice
I’ve made three changes that all makes it less damaging to lose a dice.
1. Food give +Strength when not occupied by a dice
I have added Strength symbols on all Food cards. The symbol is covered when you place an energy dice at the Food. This means that you will get stronger if you lose a dice, while the opponent will get weaker with the new dice. Thus, it will now be easier to get back that dice.
2. Gain an Item to raise your base energy generation
Before, the Items gave you reroll tiles that could be used to reroll energy dice. Now I have changed this to a more simple and direct way for Items to increase the energy generation.
You start the game with a 3 energy-tile. This is your base energy generation each turn. When you gain your first Item you flip this tile over and it will show 4 energy instead, thus increasing your energy generation by 1 energy. You will now be able to get at least 4 energy each turn, even if someone have taken all your energy dice.
3. Always gain one Sword when you lose a fight
When you lose a Fight you will now get a Sword. I have added a reminder on the Hunt stance. This makes it less likely that someone with a lot of Strength will dominate the game.
Change #3: Various Smaller Changes
1. There are “wild” hamsters guarding the Territory dice at game start.
This is mostly to make it more consistent with how the fighting works when you try to steal another hamster’s dice. Now you always need to fight to gain an energy dice, even at game start when they are placed in the territories at the game board.
The wild hamsters have only 3 Strength. This means that you will have 75% chance to win during your first turn. You can use your starting sword to guarantee a win.
2. Add a better “consolation prize” when the attacker loses a fight for the Temple
Now you will get to copy a Stance action (in addition to the +1 Sword) when you lose the fight. I want to incentivize players to take a bit of a gamble to fight for the Temple.
Bonus: More Hamster Art!
I’ve updated the Dawa artwork and also created new artwork for Wangchuk and Sangpo. hope you like them!
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