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The Citizens of the Forest's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Clarity of Rules/Mechanics | #20 | 2.950 | 2.950 |
| Use of This Year's Theme | #20 | 3.000 | 3.000 |
| Creativity/Uniqueness | #23 | 3.450 | 3.450 |
Ranked from 20 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Includes Law of Root?
Yes
Includes PnP?
Yes
Includes TTS files?
2,No
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Comments
I've never seen permanent pieces before, even in a fan faction! It's such a simple but unique premise that I'm really glad you've come up with an implemented here
I really like the wording of temporary warrior in public support. Not only could you technically ignore a hit, but they would contribute to your own rolled hits as well. Neat! And fits well in the story you're telling.
Your pieces being on the edge of clearing is also a really cool use of design space that would be interesting to watch pan out in an actual game.
One concern is that we're encouraged to craft to find those last few points for the win, like the otters! But if crafting doesn't pan out, the otters have the option to battle for those last few points in the endgame. Just a little difficult for these lil buddies to do the same. Though that's definitely something to see in playtesting rather than just looking at a board and predicting this situation to happen :P
Really cool faction with a really sweet environmental premise that I relay love sooo much. You've also left yourself space for some cool artwork once you've got your animals chosen too. Fantastic stuff!
Thanks for the encouragement! They do tend to struggle to close out games, especially since they recruit less and less as more mature trees give them continual points. I have a few changes in mind, and hope to test them out after RootJam is finished.
Sounds awesome, looking forward to seeing!
Really cool and love the theme! I like how they are tending to the trees as they grow. I was quite confused by the Outsiders ability but the Law you included did help me understand. I like the image of them running between the trees to help out with different battles. 8 warriors seems like such a little force but I think it's cool that it makes it more of a puzzle to defend the growing trees until they turn into Mature trees.
Very cool faction! What type of animal are they? I'm picturing squirrels but I don't think it was mentioned.
Thanks for the feedback! I'll try to reword the "Outsiders" ability. I think I was trying to avoid being wordy on the board itself, but might've gone too far. If you have any suggestions, let me know. The number of warriors is very limiting, but since they essentially dictate the number of actions you have on a turn (more warriors = more Swarming), I wanted to make sure they didn't overrun the board.
I didn't really have an animal in mind (this was definitely a mechanics-first design), but I like your idea of squirrels!
I love the unique theming and vibe of this faction!
I've not seen an ability like Public Support before it's a very cool idea - I do wonder about the balance since defenders already take the lower dice in battle it seems quite a high likelihood your temporary warrior might not make any difference as you won't get the hits needed for them to make an impact in the battle?
The way warriors "swarm" in I like a lot and the fact the trees become permanent with enough time is very interesting!
Other than that some of the layout of the board and wording of some things I personally found a bit unclear but that's a minor nitpick and definitely easily fixed. Thanks for including a Law of Root that for sure helped with my understanding!
Thanks for taking a look! I usually view Public Support as more of a defensive action than an offensive one (since the temporary warriors, who will disappear anyway, can absorb hits before the lone warrior). But you’re right, the advantage still lies with the attacker (especially if they can attack multiple times, and clean out your hand of cards).
Glad to hear the Law of Root helped! I’ll take another look at my board and see how to make sure they both explain the same thing.
I really dig the theme of reforestation for a faction! Permanent buildings are a very interesting concept.
I'd be a little worried if opponents would ever even let you get there - given that you can only ever have one 'actual' warrior to defend them and permanently blocking building spots + passive scoring is quite scary. On the other hand, the chance to use matching cards as mini-ambushes to add 'temporary' warriors for protection is neat. I'd be curious to see if this is enough defense for your trees, especially once they are on the verge of becoming permanent. Maybe as an alternative Public Support could add warriors of other factions present in the clearing to the defenders, or work like WA's Guerilla War at the price of a matching card? The way it is, it might also need some clarifications (do you actually place a warrior there? What if there are none in the supply? How do you deal with snares or the keep? And does this (I assume) ignore the restriction that you can only have 1 warrior per clearing?)
But I definitely think you have some nice ideas in there, like having more seedlings/saplings than mature trees in order to spread out the opportunities to grow them, or the way you incorporate the swarming theme in the attack mechanism.
I'm a big fan of the notion of evolving buildings, well incorporated!
Overall, a really good idea, seems like an interesting faction to play with the restrictions and opportunities they offer! Good jobOh also, just out of curiosity, did you have any animal species in mind for them (unless I missed it)?
No, you didn’t miss the animal. The theme was the last thing is settled on for the faction, and it came together pretty hastily. I’d probably just imagine them as a mixture of rabbits, mice, and foxes ;-)
Thanks for taking a look! I’m intrigued by your idea of involving other factions for “Public Support”. Most of my playtesting was 3-handed solitaire (for the sake of mental strain), but adding a fourth faction could provide more opportunities to make it work. As it stands, I would agree that the faction is susceptible to over-policing. The trade off is that an attack could be unsuccessful (only deal hits to spent cards) or be disproportionately detrimental (1 warrior deals 2-3 hits?). There’s also a chance to play some kind games with people (do you really want to attack me here and suffer the consequences). But it definitely needs more play testing.
As for clarifications:
- You don’t actually “add” a warrior to the clearing. I just took the cards I was spending and placed them next to the clearing as a visual reminder, and then discarded them at the end of the battle.
- For Snares, the warriors never “enter” the clearing for a Swarm (I always imagined them showing up on the outskirts and firing salvos), so there shouldn’t be any restriction (though you wouldn’t be able to recruit anyone in the clearing).
- You could Swarm the Keep, but because you can’t place pieces in the clearing, you’d never Recruit there and wouldn’t be able to Plant (you’d never have a warrior in the clearing after the warriors Disperse). So it’s doable, but it’s a purely conflict-oriented play.
Awesome idea for a faction! I really like the forced dispersion of your warriors and the permanent buildings. I think there are a few things that could use polishing to be more streamlined/in-line with Root's general phrasing of things, but I like what you have going on here and I'd definitely play it IRL. I'm a huge fan of how you bring complexity by having strange restrictions, rather than throwing a huge block of text at us.
Thanks for the feedback! I was finishing off my board at 2am, so I don’t doubt that the wording might be confusing ;-). Hope you have a chance to give it a try sometime!