Card Games – Beta-Testing A Card Game in Development

Several months ago, we had a customer come out and get a couple of board games from us so he could take them on a vacation with his wife. Good customer and we hope to see him again. Well, in our discussions, he mentioned that he had a friend that was developing a game.

Well just over a month ago, Andy Daniels contacted me and wanted to know if, as someone who has several game groups in development, I would like to host a game testing night. Of course, we said we would do what we could to assist him. We are in full support of someone trying to develop a game and break into the market.

So, I contacted a few friends and we set up a game night for him. His goal was to have a game night where he did not actually have to play the game. He wanted to watch people use the rules and try to play. Then, we would have a debriefing for him on our issues, things we liked, and possible connections or marketing ideas we might be able to offer.

We hooked up three other brave souls, because Andy told me the game played best with four or five people. We had my gaming buddy John, Brian (my old boss from Worldwide Brands and the guy with whom I played my first game of Settlers of Catan), Pam (a fellow co-worker) and me. Brian’s wife hosted and took photos for us.

After a great dinner of burgers and stuff, Andy introduced us to his game – Kingdoms & Conquest. If you were ever curious what you would get if you mashed Settlers of Catan with Magic: The Gathering, this is a close guess.

Never having played a beta version of a board or card game, I did not know what to expect. Honestly, we all really expected pieces of paper and cardboard tokens or something. We were pleasantly surprised. He brought the game out in a nice chest (not necessary – but a nice touch). There were about 400 cards. They were nicely printed double-sided cards with Photoshop comp-level art. There were two die (and one was a custom made die). I would say, for a beta level game, this one had been in development for about a year or so.

It took a little explaining to get the rules under our belt and into our heads. We all had copies of the rules, but nobody read them – they tried, but did not get it without seeing the game.
Once we started playing, we were really enjoying this game. There was some definite strategy to which deck you choose from, how you handle your military, and the process of growing your forts and strongholds.

Some interesting techniques that were built into the game included a card where every 10th turn, everyone gets a new fort, which gives you more resources. Each deck of cards had a different focus – one was defensive, one was offensive, one offered you elements of game control, one was short term economic, and the other was long term growth. Based on the cards in your hand, you had to determine which strategies (or decks) benefited you the most. We found that the custom die (the Event die) could be a real killer. Arson came up several times, and if you had more than seven cards, you had to give up about half of your cards. I think I was the victim of this about three or four times. This has a similar effect as rolling a 7 in Settlers of Catan and needing to discard half of your hand.
At the beginning of the game, you select colored resources with numbers and you earn cards based on the resources that come up on the numbered die – again, similar to Settlers of Catan.

As you build your forts, strongholds, and armies, you need to start thinking as if you were playing Magic: the Gathering. You are building armies that can defend and attack. It becomes a little complicated because you have to consider what other players might do. Several times we ganged up on other players – one would attack and wear down the defenses, while the next player would swoop in after the battle and go for the kill and take a fort with all its resources.

There were some other cool things. At one point, John got a card that allowed him to steal resources from Pam. So, every time Pam would get two resources on her stronghold, she would have to give one to John.

We found the majority of the game to be very defensive. There was definitely a beginning, middle, and end-game. The end-game was where the action was because we were all attacking each other. Personally, I would have preferred it to be a bit more of an offensive game. On the whole though, it was well thought through and the balancing was coming along. We ended the game with a close score. The goal is to get to 10 points. I think we were all around 8 or 9 points, when John won with 10. John built an army that was essentially unstoppable due to some good fortune on his part.
The game lasted about three hours, which Andy said was about average. I suspect the next time we play it will be about 2.5 hours – due to familiarity with the rules.

The discussions afterwards yielded some interesting feelings about the game. Everyone playing liked the game and would play again. I was pretty adamant about the fact that I would like more offense in the game. Others agreed but did not have as strong a feeling. We also agreed that this is not a game for the casual gamer. There was too much involved with playing it for a random person to pick up the game on a whim – which was fine for Andy. He said that was not his target market, anyway. Another interesting idea that came from the test was the idea of a beginner version and an advanced version. How they are packaged was still up for discussion.

By the way, this photo is of Brian’s “whiner” hat. At some other time, we will put up a post about this hat and how you too can effectively use it in your gaming adventures.

Last I heard from Andy, he said that he developed and tweaked a few more cards so the game would offer more offensive-type options earlier in the game. I think we said he was also looking at the multiple version idea.

We are trying to set up another test night. Once we replay the game, I will post another update to the development of this interesting game.

On the flip side of this…if you are a game publisher and are looking for an interesting new game for your catalog, Andy is definitely in the market for a publisher. Contact us, at Best Dang Games, and we will forward your contact information to Andy.

Also, Andy is looking for playtesters in the Orlando area. If you are interested in trying this game out, you can either e-mail me directly at bcbcusiness at hotmail.com and I can forward your information on…or you can can eliminate my involvement and contact him yourself at andykimdaniels at gmail.com.