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designer_tutorials:tutorials:factories:starting_bonus_schematics

Starting Bonus Schematics


Setting the starting bonus in the Colors Tab to non-default, causes the factories to not work in the first turn of the players with such setting. If this is a problem to your board, some solutions are presented. In addition, using factories will allow you to extend the starting bonus for more than one turn.

Note that, unlike the traditional way, these bonuses will stack with other ones, instead of replacing them.

To understand the tutorial properly, it is important to know the difference between game seat and setup seat, for they are not the same thing, though they can coincide in some situations. Game seat refers to the seating position a player has been given at the start of a game. For example, game seat #2 means the player in this seat is the 2nd to take the turn. Setup seat is a placeholder that can potentially be attributed to a player. When a player is allocated to a given setup seat number, he will own all territories with this seat, at the start of the game. A player can get game seat #3 and setup seat #8, for example. The only situation where game seat and setup seat have allways the same number, is when the board has game seating order locked to the setup seating order.


Same Bonus For All Players


Here, n represents the maximum number of players allowed by the board. Each territory must be allocated to a different seat in the Setup of the Designer or in the XML of the board. These territories are unconnected to the playboard and hidden from view - refer to Off Board Sandbox for instructions.

Regardless of the type of allocation (random or locked to seat or color), each player will get one of these territories at the start of the game. If the game is set by less players than the maximum allowed by the board, then some of these territories will go to Neutral and their factories will be silent for the entirety of the game.

As the schematic shows, at the start of each player's turn, the territory allocated to him will trigger a factory that gives the player an X amount of reserve units. In alternative, the factory can be directed to a territory in the playboard if the designer desires, and makes sure it will be owned by the intended player at the start of his first turn - multiple factories targeting multiple territories are also a possibility.

In addition, the hidden territory self neutralises itself with an AutoNeutral factory and all his factories will be silent for the rest of the game. This method works for any Abandonment and Neutral Reversion setting (check Rules) and all territories can be loaded with 0 units.

For the sake of simplicity, in the following schematics, it will be assumed that each territory has at least one bonus giving factory and a self neutralising factory.


Extending the Bonus for Several Turns

To extend the bonus to m+1 turns, create m rows of territories similar to the first one - the only difference is that these territories are initially set to Neutral.

Link the territories with AutoCapture factories, as shown in the schematic, and the rows will be sequentially activated for the set amount of turns. The bonus given by each row can be different if desired.



Specific Bonus to Each Player

Preset Allocation

If allocation is locked to seat order or to color, the designer can easily set a specific bonus to each player by simply setting the bonus value of the bonus giving factories owned by each territory.


Random Allocation

If allocation is random, then, the designer must devise a way to ensure the specific bonuses, given to each game seat, are the same for any allocation combination of the territories dedicated to this task.

Integer Increment

Usually, the designer wishes to give more bonus the later the player takes the turn. This is done to counter the early move advantage present in many boards. This schematic provides an integer bonus increment to each player the later his/her turn.

Each column, below the first row, has n territories set to Neutral, and can be thought as belonging to the seat allocated to the territory above it. During the 1st turn round, each seat will steal one territory, and therefore, a bonus giving factory, from each other seat, while resetting any territory already stolen from it. The territories in the main diagonal do not need to exist.

One can then realise, from the point of view of a given seat, the stolen territories from seats that have already taken their turn, will stay active for the next round, while the territories stolen from seats who are yet to take their turn will be neutralised. Thus, a position later in the turn order is equivalent to holding an additional territory, hence, an additional piece of the starting bonus - the size of this piece is the bonus value of the factory owned by each of these territories. Assuming all seats are taken, or in other words, that the game is being played with the maximum number of players allowed by the board, the 1st seat will receive no bonus and the last seat will receive a*n bonus, where a is the bonus value of the mentioned factories - it follows that a is the increment between seats.

If not all seats are taken by players, then each active seat will steal an extra territory for each non-taken seat, and the bonus differences will remain the same. The total bonus will vary, however.

Note that these bonuses are given in the 2nd round of turns and serve mainly to set a different bonus to each seat. If the designer wishes to have different absolute bonus values, he/she can complement them by factories outside of this scheme. As usual, in the first round, the territories in the first row can be used for hosting factories that give an equal bonus to all players, if desired. These territories can also host factories that capture an additional row of territories for complementing the bonus given in the 2nd round, just like presented in the Extending the Bonus for Several Turns section.


In this variation of the above scheme, the seats also capture a territory from their own stash. The end result is that the total bonus is increased by a for all players. These extra territories, that is, the ones from the main diagonal, can be, however, used to modulate the total bonus given, by using a different value for the bonus - this value needs to be the same for the bonus giving factories owned by these territories.


Capping the Bonus

For large boards, the designer usually wants the bonus to cap out at a certain limit so that the increased bonus for the players taking the later game seats do not go over the balancing act, that is, that they instead, have an advantage over the earlier seats.

One way to solve this problem, is to direct the bonuses given in the above schemes to territories with a unit max limit (one territory per setup seat). These territories can be placed in or around the playboard (allways inside the limits of the boardmap image though), and have a one-way fortify border, either to all territories of the playboard or to a given set of territories, as the designer desires.

Fixing Bonus Variation with Number of Players

As mentioned before, if the number of players in a given game is less than the maximum allowed by the board, each player will hold extra stolen territories, thus gaining more pieces of the bonus.

To make the bonus independent of the number of players, set the territories created in the Capping the Bonus section to Neutral - if you don't have them yet, create them (if you don't want the bonus cap, don't set a unit limit). Add Universal factories, with bonus equal to a, from each territory from the first row present in the integer increment schematics, to each of the newly created ones.* Set the factories designed for the incremental bonus to AutoCapture, where each row targets one of the newly created territories.

In the first turn, the newly created territories will be preloaded with part of the 2nd turn bonus. In the 2nd turn, the bonus giving factories from the incremental scheme will capture the territories and complete the bonus, making them usable for each player.

Notice that, for each less player on the board, the first part of the 2nd turn bonus will decrease by a, countering the extra stolen territory from the integer increment scheme.

*The factories where the owner and the target belong to the same seat, do not need to exist.

designer_tutorials/tutorials/factories/starting_bonus_schematics.txt · Last modified: 2017/05/19 20:04 by redshift