Pizarro is a game where you just bid on a bunch of dudes, and they're worth victory points, and the game is over. Modern Art, you do that six or seven times. Medici, I think, is also another game where it's just auctions all the time.
Now, it amazes me how often we'll play auction games. So, as players, how to be good at auctions? Actually figure out what things are worth. Come up with some way to value these items. And think about it. Do you know how many times we play Modern Art, there's a painting that's up. We're playing with someone who's played the game before, they know the rules. It cannot be worth more than $30 play blackjack here. $30 is the most it could possibly be worth. And some kid will be like, "I bid $35." What's wrong with you? I don't know what to do about that. And many of you might be doing that too. I've done it on occasion. Auctions, it's really hard to value stuff. So, get good at auctions, and you'll be able to win pretty much any game that involves auctions in any capacity, because every other player will be terrible at them. And the biggest difficulty of auctions is that you have to value something in terms of something else. So, you might know exactly, that's 5 victory points, that's work 6. But you're not buying them with victory points, you're buying them with coins. And you have to know how many victory points is a coin worth. Well, in something like Seven Wonders, there's n auctions but you know- 3 coins, I think, is a victory point? Yeah. Modern Art coins are victory points. In Puerto Rico, early in the game a doubloon is worth multiple victory points. Late in the game a doubloon is worth less than a victory point. So, you have to know what turn it is, and on that turn, figure out how many victory points is a coin worth right now. Not easy to figure out, in addition to evaluating whatever it is that you're buying. Psychology also is a huge component on auctions. We used to play games with this guy in upstate New York years ago, where he was very... Scott could troll him to a point that was legendary. So, any auction game, he'd think very carefully and be like, - "I bid 14." - "15." And then he'd sit there for another minute like, - "I bid 17." - "18." This would infuriate him and he would not let Scott beat him in the auction. And the reason I was able to do that is because before it even started, I had said, "That is worth $26." And I would just bid up, exactly by one, to pay as least as possible, and if it got to $27, I'd say I'm out. But simultaneously, Scott isn't bidding his value, because he knows the guy hasn't figured that out. The guy is calculating. This is kind of the psychology. You watch him calculating. He hasn't figured out what he's going to bid. So, when Scott is immediately saying what the next bid is, the guy is thrown off. He doesn't have time to calculate suddenly. He feels pressured. He feels like Scott knows something he doesn't. And he didn't like Scott. I wonder why. Sometimes Scott would just bid him up until he'd spend all his money on something worth nothing. And it's like you might think, well, I don't have to calculate anything. I'll just keep bidding up by one until everyone else stops, then I'll have the right number. No. You'll be over by one. You'll lose that way. Don't do that. If you've played Power Grid, if you're off by one in the second round, you're probably going to lose the game, if everyone knows what they're doing. I like Mr. Sleepy over here. Okay. So, if you are making games, when do you put in an auction? Usually when you put in auctions, it becomes an auction game. It's one of those mechanics that sort of dominates everything else. It's like putting chocolate in something. The chocolate flavor overpowers all the other flavors. Right, because basically what happens is, even though you might cut a lot of other things in the game, like Power Grid has tons of stuff in there besides just the auction. The auctions matter so much in determining who wins, that the other parts matter less. Like where to put your houses in Power Grid, you put them in the cheapest spot you can. Maybe you deny someone a spot, it's not really the.... Right? How much resources do you buy in the market? You buy what you need to power your buildings. Do you buy a turn ahead? Maybe if there's a lot of cheap resources. Not very difficult. Most of determining who wins Power Grid is the auction for the power plants. Now, you also use auctions if, as a game designer, you're lazy and you don't want to figure out what your widgets are worth. Think about magic cards. When you make a magic card, if you're a magic game designer, you have to put, in the top left corner of that card, how much mana it is to play that card. Which means it's up to you, the game designer, to get that right. If you're off by one, you could break the game. Someone will be like, "Yes, this is so cheap!" Boom, boom, boom. "I win!" That's why there's no Moxxi's around anymore. So now imagine if every magic card was just sort of like, "?" We do an auction for that magic card. Now, it's up to the players to balance your game for you. That would be a cool variant. A mana auction. Cards come up and you auction, you bid with your tapping mana to play the cards from a central pool.
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AuthorJustin Rusmussen is a famous traveler from Canada and Casino Guru at Casinoslots. He visited 30 countries. He is a Amateur internet fanatic, Friendly bacon aficionado, Travel buff, Unapologetic weebly nerd. ArchivesCategories |