Gathering Game - Slice Of Genius Or The Babblings Of A Demented Git?

RopeDrink

Well, given that my job basically requires 12hrs of boredom endurance, I tend to think of all manner of things to slip out of reality and basically vegitate until said 12hrs have past, generally playing music in my head or re-watching scenes of films, wondering what I'm going to do once I'm off work or god knows what else my head can dredge up...

But today, no sooner had I entered work, I had one abnormally crazy thought...

Anyone who remotely knows me is aware of the fact that I'm an obsessive creative (If such a thing exists) and all my spare time not dedicated to real life tasks is spent making stuff, from games, music, poems, novels, artwork... All manner of things...

Well, last night, as I went through a rampant Bikination Frenzy after having created three new Gathering Cards, I had a mad, yet interesting idea...
How about I create a game that actually uses the Gathering Cards?
A Yu-Ghi-Oh style battle game where one must win over posts and threads via utilising a deck of Gathering Cards to best the opposition...

Either that or a game recreation of Boards.ie where you can play as either a Poster, Moderator or Adminisrator (Each representive a level of difficulty) and having to deal with the daily **** that can be thrown at you, using a host of souped up Gathering Cards on the way (Or battling against them) to win over the site!?

Now now now, before giving me the boggled look, I ask if anyone remembers the time when I decided to write a fun novel'ish type of story involving Boards.ie being a floating apartment block, where the moderators where the head of specific offices and the admins where gods whom resided on the roof of the block in their luxury suite, and the entire building got invaded by muppets with which we had to team up and slay for the greater good!?

I have a link somewhere - Reread it lately and laugh I did as the memories came flooding back, but at the same time, I do realise how sad it may seem to some that I am willing to put time and effort into recreating this site into something... Odd, despite it being all out odd in the first place!

Gah, that aside, it's a fun idea that would put the Gathering Cards to some use rather than as a single picture response to certain events that happen here. It'll require a lot of time and effort, and I would have to assemble some form of team for the job, seeing as I'd have to break the entire site (and how it works) into mathmatical equations to be used in the Game Engine, as well as countless Image rehashes of the cards themselves... It sounds far fetched, yes, but the way I saw it in my head... Man, I'd play it

This could be the makings of something fresh and interesting, or a simple sign that I need to take those sleeping tablets and realise that three days of staying awake doth not a sane man make... I'll let you decide that.
If this isn't met with a positive response, then may I also give another suggestion.

Before going through my Gathering Card rage, I took a look at the Site Map representation of Boards.ie's Gathering Card collection and felt that a lot of the newer ones should be included (Those that are deemed worthy, of course).

Either way, I'm fizzing with all manner of brain juices and if I don't put them to some constructive use I'll probably keel over and foam out random incoherent bull**** on my floor until the doctors find me.
I won't give out any of my ideas yet, for fear people will think me more crazy than I actually am, but I'm willing to work on this and shed a new light on this site.

Give me your thoughts people - Is this a slice of genious, or the babbling of a demented git?

Gone West

ropey.
Im up for it.
*nods*
chat you on IRC mabye.

Tar.Aldarion

haha,sounds cool and at the very least it would be quite interesting to see what is come up with.no harm in trying and all that.plus i love my card games.

WhiteWashMan

i would have to equate you to one of those bizarre card gamers that frighten me very much. on a very deep level.
not so much frighten, as disturb...

anyway, just make sure my cards are all powerful.

by the way, what ever happened to that novel with the bar and all that good stuff about boardS?

RopeDrink

Well my good sir, I had started writing up actual segments (Had three in total) when I finally discovered I owed Eircom a 2000 'Punt' internet bill, which can be hard to pay off when unemployed, and is certainly not viewed in a good light when the bill is in the name of your estranged father, who picked up my PC and smashed it into the floor several times until it shattered, rendering 4 years of work (CS / HL / TFC Maps & Mods - Flash Games - Novels - Poems - The hundreds of mp3's I had downloaded for half an hour each over Napster on 56k and, of course, the 'Boarder' [The Boards story]) into 56k ownage C: Drive shattered oblivion.

Thankfully that was years ago and, considering I'm all growed up now, that sort of thing is very unlikely to happen now that I've moved on

Shame really, the amount of support and idea's I got just had me brain fizzling with ideas, and the whole project was going so well.

As for this project, seeing as I only work three days a week (And dedicate about one or two nights per fortnight for partying) I have plenty of time to partake in all my hobbies outside of Real Life - And considering I've dropped my writing and replaced it with game making (An act I've been undertaking since I was seven years old using C Basic on the C64) I decided that maybe it was time to put it to good use...

And of course your cards are powerful - Afterall, there is only one SuperTroll

Tar.Aldarion

'there can be only one'


*challanges to a duel whilst dreaming of the supertroll trophy*

CuLT

Yes, a supertroll trophy of dubious origin, vaguely outlined power and ambiguous value!

I love Highlander.

DeVore

Considering they just announced one for Penny Arcade
I think this is a funny idea. Could it actually become a reality or is it simply a fun idea to kick about?

DeV.

nesf

I know a few Magic Judges.

I can work on keeping them as far away as possible from this.

RopeDrink

Damn - Had written out a large response but it crashed the browser.

I'll take a little more time over it now.

Basically, you start off either by playing as a specific Old Skooler, Regular Poster, Regular Moderator or Admin (Each offering different levels of difficulty and various scenarios)

From there you assign yourself some starting statistics, such as Humour Points / Debate Points etc which will effect your overall 'Regular Response' Ability, which will be used when you have no Gathering Cards, or simply have none that suit the thread you are playing.

'Post Count' , 'Rank' , 'Karma' and 'Experience' determine how many threads you can view in one day (Rounds you can play in one session) and these are created randomly by the game itself, or if you wish, you can 'create' your own battles (limited depending on the above mentioned attributes) which will give you a basic starting bonus. From there, responses by the game will be 'Posted', with which you have to decipher what the bests means of responding are. Acting the muppet in underserving threads result in bad karma, for example, or squashing a muppet in good humour will gain you karma (Two basic examples of how each thread can be played).

Depending on your attributes, your basic responses can be enough to pull you through most scenarios, but if computer played Gathering Cards emerge, this is where the game gets tricky, for you have to decide wether you wish to challenge the thread furthur and, if you do, what the best course of action is. Do you simply laugh along and get lynched by other posters? Do you criticise it and risk losing karma for being percieved as a muppet? Do you throw in a gathering card in an attempt to squash the scenario in good humour and gain reputation? These are basic examples of how it all works.

The results of each thread determine what you gain statistic wise, and as you gain in experience / attributes / karma etc you become a more solid power player here on Boards, and gain access to aditional cards and threads to challenge.

All of this takes place within a specific time zone (Say, 50 days - Which can be up to 250 threads given your rank permits 5 threads per day as an example) and within those 50 days you have to see how far up the Boards.ie ladder you can go.

If you keep neglecting playing threads, you risk your account being cleared due to inactivity - If you continuously get lynched or try to be funny by acting the muppet, you risk getting banned. If your attributes become so low (beit lack of experience or by reducing them via playing specific cards [Which in some cases will require specific attributes to be played] then all your basic responses are reduced to that of dribbling muppetry, making it harder for you to make a come back, so one must be careful.

Also, keeping your hands on cards such as 'New Nick, Same Crap' and 'Turned Into Newt' will allow you to return after bannage, but at the cost of overall statistic points (Call them the key to an extra lives, if you will).

At the start of every round (day) you are allowed to select a specific amount of cards from a randomly given list that you can keep for later use, depending on your current rank or depending on what role you are playing. Obviously, playing an administrator (Easy Mode [lol - I know THAT's up for debate]) allows you access to all Admin & Moderator related cards. Moderators [Medium] would recieve access to all Moderator related cards and high powered regular cards, while regular posters [Hard] will have to make to make do with whatever they can get their hands on.

Of course, for example, if you wanted to take up the role of an Old Skooler or regular poster (Let's say myself as an example) you will be given a card associated with that player, ie. RopeDrink's Amazing Rant, RopeDrink's Amazing Bluntness or RopeDrink's Amazing Biki'nation which can be used once per undecided (as of yet) time period.

All cards would need to be reduced to values, in the event that a Gathering Card face off ensues, for example me playing my Amazing Rant against a Flaming Muppet card would result in my current Rant statistics + Card value vs the Flaming Muppet Card Value judging whom wins the fight. If I win, I lose humour (As explained in my card) but end up gaining overall Karma / Experience to be used later on. Get what Im on about?

This is a basic overdraft of what the game would entail, but for me to make it happen I would need help from pretty much everyone.

For a start, an 'official' Boards.ie Deck needs to be decided on, and all these cards require to be given a fair value. They also need to be colour co-ordinated depending on effects, so a bit of Photoshop editing and New Gathering Card lists need to be made. Ontop of that, all cards that dont make the official deck will be used in a randomised humourous 'News' segment that will happen on the main page every new round, so cards that don't make the official deck will still get used.

If people wish to take this seriously, then a designated area for these discussions would also be helpful, especially given the amount of feedback that would be needed to make the game overall enjoyable.

Anyhow, give us a thought so far and let me know wether this should be a project to look into, or yet another botched idea from my damaged cranium!

RopeDrink

Added a new idea.

When not playing as an Administrator, there will be bars representing the likelyhood of an Administrator card being played.

As your muppetry increases, so does a bar representing the likelihood of DeVore's Intervention / 12*Clicked card being played, as well as other frequently updated bars filling up as the liklihood of the forum crashing due to 'Regi Say's Oops', or an overall update happening due to 'Cloud 9' card being played, will need to be constantly in check. (Does Ecksor not have his own card? - That needs to be changed )

Also, the ability to plant a 'Troll' can gain / drain you points depending on how it is kept in check, and how effective it actually is.

Spam cards also allow mass Post Count increase, at the cost / gain of popularity depending on their effectiveness.

Of course, another feature would be the double card ability, where coinciding cards can be played for multiple effects if you have them in your hand (ie by saving one card in the hope of gaining a corresponding one) allowing for massive effects all around (For the greater good / evil).

More idea's to follow.

Come on people, I need feedback here lest I infect this topic with all manner of dribble to the point where I over complicate things.
Get posting.

RopeDrink

And I'll be adding a 'Who Are You?' style feature where you can fill out a questionnaire to discover which Gathering Card owning Old Skool ****er you are.

This will be 128% Gold!

Time to sleep before I start Bikinating about everything.

Earthhorse

What a bizarre coincidence. The other morning I woke up with an idea for boards user Top Trumps game. I figured it would work like traditional Top Trumps pretty much, using say the top 100 or so posters and comparing stats like no. of posts, no. of forums modded, date registerd (the earlier the better) and so forth.

I was going to post it in the Cuckoo's Nest as an idea for a thread game only I couldn't work out how to assign users to users (if you follow) and boards was down all day. By the time evening rolled around I'd lost my enthusiasm for the idea and, like yourself, wasn't sure if it was a stroke of genius or a foolish and doomed idea from the get go.

I guess what I'm saying is a Top Trumps type game might be easier to code than a Magic type thing, but whatever floats your boat.

amp

This thread wrote:

words

Can somebody summarise this thread for me? I'm viciously hungover.

Hobbes

amp wrote:

Can somebody summarise this thread for me? I'm viciously hungover.

Ropedrink is making boards.ie card game. Amp Card will beat all.

amp

Hobbes wrote:

Ropedrink is making boards.ie card game. Amp Card will beat all.

\o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ WINNAR \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/

Tar.Aldarion

those ideas sound real good mr. drink.

Sarky

I wholeheartedly endorse this product or service. Good luck with it.

RopeDrink

Appreciate all the replies so far guys, but I need more than endoursements if I'm to make anything out of this.

I hope nobody deems me evil for Requesting A Gathering Forum but I sincerely feel a lot more can be made out of the cards other than simple picture responses to threads... Maybe even money!

I've already got the rules made out for an official Gathering Card game which would go down a treat if we had an official deck lamenated - It'd be fast, furious, and ideal for placing bets on. I could create a PC version, but you'd only be able to play the PC, and even at that, I'm not an amazing AI programmer.

In regards to the forum, it might be a nice place to organise the Gathering Cards even if nothing else is made out of them, as well as storing them up for later use (Possibly via the Gathering Site Map seeing as it hasn't been updated since the first time I saw it years ago).

Guys and Gals, if you want me to make anything out of this thread (And my madness) I'm going to need some HELP...

I'll need to revamp pretty much ALL cards via Photoshop, Assess and create a fair card value system, work on deciding an official deck and, if the interest is high, get to the physical side of the project and start making the decks / programme.

If we have a forum for this purpose, even if it's a temporary one, I'll be able to throw everything in there and get all those willing, to help out any and all ways they can to help make this slightly mad but damn well decent idea underway.

Throw me your thoughts!

RopeDrink

Amp Card will beat all.

Someday, you will be able to prove it!!!
Sign up now for the upcoming 'FlameWar' Gathering Card Game - Money$$$$ required. BRING YOUR OWN DECK!

Sarky

RopeDrink wrote:

Throw me your thoughts!

Fair enough.

Do you have an idea of which cards will replace lands, which ones creatures, which ones sorceries, and so on? I'll be happy to throw you any suggestions that spring to mind.

Would certain forums or categories count as lands? They could supply, say, Troll "mana", Spam "mana", Serious-reply "mana", or something like that. Use them to fuel action cards like, oh, say Masterful Flame needs 3 Troll and any other "mana".

Oh, getting kicked out. I'll probably add more later.

RopeDrink

While I really do danke for throwing me said Ideas, I think my version of the game is already getting lost on people
It's not exactly like that, Sarky, but as I said if we had a forum for Gathering Discussion we could decide on a system that would work the best.

In regards to the actual hand held card version (Via a Deck) anyone who has played spot will understand what I'm getting at (I'll post the game rules later) but as for the PC game I had in mind, well, maybe I better re-read my fourty page explanation above and try to summarise it... I think I'm starting to confuse myself, but it still all works out nicely in my mind

nesf

"Moderator Counter-Troll" "I wanted to show these n00bs how to troll properly"

RopeDrink

Nesf, you have successfully sealed my confusion!

Goodshape

Ha, sounds a great idea

I'll be up for helping out in the rephotoshopaging department.. wouldn't be too up to speed with the workings of these card games but I'd be able to follow instructions at least

Raphael

So, would the principle be in any way similar to that weird version of MGS with cards? Can't remember what twas called...think it was for the DS.

RopeDrink

We've been over-run by turtles!

The thing is that wether the PC or Actual Card games are invented, they will be unique - Obviously due to the fact that they 'are' their own cards, but also because the rules and regulations I have in mind for both don't actually stem from 'ANY' game other than the one swimming around in my squishy brain.

This is why I requested a forum a few posts into this topic, because I now realise that this is going to be painstakedly hard to explain without going into pin-point accurate detail, but the very very VERY first thing I need to do, which will give me the starting step, is to decipher a fair Value system after I figure out an 'official' deck.

But I can't really lay claim to the Gathering Cards and sort out an official deck seeing as 99% of the cards are not mine, the idea was started by Hobbes (ie. Not me) and both games will involve 'Boards.ie' which, also, does not belong to me.

Assuming the people involved don't mind me using the names / items in my project, then I will still need all said people to help me, for I'll be making the project for everyone, not just for myself.

This will require a mass effort to make it happen - And while I appreciate people's thumbs up, only a few people so far have actually mentioned that they would help me.

I guess if I list out the requirements, then that might help.

1) Possibly a temporary forum to collect feedback / store resources / rule posting and all relative information.
2) The 'Permission' to use all elements involved ie. Gathering cards and the Boards.ie site name.
3) Denote wether enough people actually WANT me to make a Card / PC game involving Boards & it's collected Gathering Cards. (The card version would be much easier to make, as well as more playable and fun)
4) The help of at least one or two Photoshop Users to edit all text and border colours of each individual card, as well as design a 'back' for the actual card deck.
5) Enlist the aid of people whom have great knowledge into the cards, and all the aspects they imply. (The original card creator being an obvious choice for one [Hobbes] and anyone else familiar with any and all 'implications' the cards uphold)
6) General feedback and game testing from as many people as possible.
7) Rule criticism and testing.

There's a whole lot more that will crop up as we progress, hence the forum idea, or any other designated area. Even if you want me to relay all Gathering Game info into the feedback forum (so long as nobody minds) or a forum that is fitting, then this will do the job just as good.

It is absolutely pointless me continuing to post details unless I can get the basics going, with which the progress can then be posted and all needed material can be decided apon.

Gah, I've created a monster.

BlitzKrieg

i sure am up for this...but if you get a forum, do up a guide for dummies thread before anything else...i have never played magic...but i do enjoy the gathering cards on boards. ANd always wanted to do a mess game thread with them.


someone mentioned penny arcade doing it. here's another place thats done it already. though like our gathering cards, alot of them are injokes i dont get http://conservativejustice.com/snfccg/snfccg/

RopeDrink

It seems to be the in-thing these days, although I was unaware of anyone else taking it up until people started talking about Penny Arcade doing it (A site I never really gave any time, as of yet).

There was me thinking I was doing something crazy and unique for the fun factor

if you get a forum, do up a guide for dummies thread before anything else

That's the first thing I do (and have done) for any and all forums I ever moderated. This one, however, will (If it happens) be quite a unique one indeed

BlitzKrieg

unique is good. can you shout like the guys on yu gi ho when we put a card down...and have those long over complicated explanatiosn of how we have tricked our oponents?

CuLT

BlitzKrieg wrote:

unique is good. can you shout like the guys on yu gi ho when we put a card down...and have those long over complicated explanatiosn of how we have tricked our oponents?

http://www.eirtaku.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=703&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=20