Gave it a test on a little village and I like the difference! The main thing I like about it is that power can blob and shift freely no matter the size of the settlement. Previously, I felt like with small villages, I was just constantly shifting one or two population tokens between factions.
A few things I was unclear on while playtesting the new power rules:
1. Is there an intended maximum power pool like there is with the population pool, or do we simply produce tokens from a nebulous pool as instructed? Are we to instead relocate tokens from the city to a faction?
2. We place the initial two tokens on our first resource. Does this mean the initial faction card placement takes one of these, or do we add a new one from the pool? My brain wants to interpret the tokens on resources as "Control of this resource is worth X power to the faction who controls it."
3. If so, what happens when there's only one token left on the resource but another faction gains power? Do they take it from a different faction, take a new token from pool, or just not gain power in order to leave at least 1 token in the city?
5. Is there an intended interpretation for the majority of power tokens being in the city? Does this imply that this amount of power is spread among the citizens? That the factions fight over it and that power is constantly in flux? Is it assumed that the faction with the majority of power controls all the rest of the power not allocated to another faction? Specifically, what do tokens left on resources symbolize?
I have a feeling 5 is supposed to be up to individual player interpretation, but I figured I'd ask just in case. (The rules lawyer in me must know...!)
Presuming a great deal, I came up with this. Perhaps the placement of the power tokens (the purple ones) will help you spot any unintended interpretations I made of the rules?
She's an elven pegasus ranch originally set up as an outpost meant to breed steeds for a war effort further off. Came out kinda peculiar for an elven settlement, but the important part is the way power tokens ended up getting placed. :)
Viewing post in Overhauled Power Rules comments
Thanks for the test and the detailed writeup! I'll try to reply to your points below. Also sorry for the long delay in getting back to you. The best route for quick feedback is the Discord (http://www.discordgg/nowhereprophet)
1. Maximum Power Pool?
No. Whenever a resource is added, more power-tokens a put into the city. And vice versa.
2. Initial Tokens?
The idea is that the city starts with a resource and two power tokens. Then one of these tokens is moved to the leading faction as they are in control of that resource.
3. Gaining Power?
Well, when a faction gains power they can take ANY NUMBER of tokens from ANY SOURCE. So you could take one power token from the remaining resource. Or one from another faction. Or both. A small sidenote that tokens that are not on the map (but on a faction instead) are still considered to be "in the city".
5. Tokens on resources?
Tokens on resources symbolize power potential that is present in the city but not leveraged by anyone. It is meant to be vague on purpose to allow for a wide variety of interpretations that suit your story.
Feedback on your map
I love the impression pictures you put on there. I think that's a great way of making even a simple map seem a lot more alive!
Also it seems like you only had the initial power token on the faction from the step during founding. And I'm a bit confused about the one token free-floating in the district there.
The idea is that:
- Adding resources adds power tokens to the city
- Factions gaining or losing power redistribute these power tokens
No worries about the delay, I was away from itch.io for a good while anyway. Literally checking for the first time right now, haha! Thanks for the detailed reply as well.
Okay interesting, so with regards to gaining power, it seems a need to think a little more abstract and not be afraid to give a faction a whole slew of tokens if the fiction seems to indicate they might have taken a boatload of power. So rather than taking it only from another faction, I could also have them take full control of a resource. It's possible I could put them "in power" without taking a single token from another faction, if there are enough available.
With regards to the free-floating token, basically what happened is a resource was lost and I wasn't sure what to do with the token that was left on it, haha! I decided to kind of leave it sitting there as a nebulous "power up for grabs", but it never did really sit well with me.
Thanks again for the deep reply, but one final question! Given your summary... Would you say a game should aim to have all the potential power in the city tied up with factions (give or take a few)?
I get the feeling overall that the main mistake I've been making with my approach is I've been a bit too tentative with power distribution, waiting for the game to tell me exactly how many tokens to allocate and assuming "one token" when it didn't. It feels like I need to be a bit more liberal with factions acquiring power.
There's no specific aim for how you should distribute your power tokens. They are an indicator of the dynamics of a power struggle but save for a few events that refer to the "leading faction" they have little mechanical bearing, so you are free to deal with them as you wish. It's just important to note that gaining / losing power may move more than one power token.
Also as a note: when a resource is removed, 2 power tokens need to be removed from the city as well. Probably from the resource on the map but also from factions, if some had been moved off.