We were supposed to have decided the next theme already, so this is a bit late.  How about we leave voting open until Monday night to let non-weekend players get a chance to vote. 

Previously there was some discussion about having an 'open theme', where any maps submitted during the appropriate period would be a contestant for the contest.  I think there are still some things to work out here.  What is the  appropriate period?  For a themed contest there is 8-months to develop, but it overlaps with a second theme.  Maybe only that last half would be the submission period for an open themed contest?  Also, what if we have a ton of contestants.  Should we extend the playing/voting time to give more time to play every contestant, or should we relax the requirement to play every map before voting (maybe only require playing 75% of the maps or something).

Anyway, feel free to vote/discuss in this thread.  I'll vote sometime this weekend once we've had a chance for some discussion.

Do we have any idea what the average rate of board creation is? That way we could get a sense for how many boards would likely be submitted in a given time period, which would be helpful.

I went to the board page, grid mode, sort by release date.  Looks like Fantastica is the earliest map released within a year.   So I count 33 maps released in the last year.

So a 4 month period would be about 11 maps, but maybe not all of the designers will want or know about the contest.  Of course that might be balanced by people who hold their finished maps to get into the contest.  So maybe 10-12 is a good estimate if we have a 4-month window.

 Should we extend the playing/voting time to give more time to play every contestant, or should we relax the requirement to play every map before voting (maybe only require playing 75% of the maps or something).

I would argue for relaxing the voting a bit. I didn't vote last time, because there were a couple of maps that didn't interest me, while a few of them I played a bunch of times and could give a pretty good review of...

itsnotatumor wrote:

 Should we extend the playing/voting time to give more time to play every contestant, or should we relax the requirement to play every map before voting (maybe only require playing 75% of the maps or something).

I would argue for relaxing the voting a bit. I didn't vote last time, because there were a couple of maps that didn't interest me, while a few of them I played a bunch of times and could give a pretty good review of...

IMO, if it's only a handful of maps, people should have to play all of them.  It's not that hard to play one game on a map & it can be a private one if you don't want it to affect your ranking.  If we were to relax the requirements, I would prefer something like (6 or less maps = you have to play all the maps.  6-12 maps = you have to play at least 80% of the maps, 12+ maps = you have to play at least 60% of the maps).

RPG

Role Playing Games or Rocket Propelled Grenades?

I should have mentioned that votes should follow a standard top 3 ranked list.   Some previous theme suggestions have been collected here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uXYx7JuYJbw4ZW66qydh2sQztb8OtxkB28H9Cdc0ZBo/edit?usp=sharing

Here are my votes:

#1) Religion/Mythology

#2) Role Playing Games

#3) Board Games

Game of Thrones :)

After reading http://www.wargear.net/forum/showthread/3211/Darkness_Falls_Dev_Journal#post_1 and enjoying the Hex board, my vote would be for "unusual game mechanics".

That is, all boards have to use the game engine to achieve an unusual twist of some sort on the mechanics.

tom wrote:

Game of Thrones :)

How about that be rephrased as "Empires and Kingdoms" so as to not be so specific that we end up with 10 maps of Britain with made-up royal families.

And I vote for this.

1. Open Theme

2. Interesting Game Mechanics

3. RPG

Isn't including interesting game mechanics inherent to making any board? The theme is mostly just a paint job.

only for some. i tend for the more simple aspects as i don't know if i can wrap my head around some of the newfangled complications they add. although they do allow for some interesting things.

Cramchakle wrote:

Isn't including interesting game mechanics inherent to making any board? The theme is mostly just a paint job.

No.

Look at the entries in the current contest.  For several, including mine, the whole point of the board is that the theme teaches you something.  But the mechanics of play are fairly straightforward.  If there was an "Empires and Kingdoms" contest I'd expect the same thing - a series of pretty boards with routine play mechanics.

Now contrast to the work you put in to get a lighting effect.  Or that Amidon37 put in to create the pure logic game, Hex.  Or that M57 is putting in to try to create supply line games, and natural barriers that recreate themselves after you pass.  The point of those boards is to create some specific unusual game effect, and the actual board itself really is just a paint job over that.

IMO, 'interesting game mechanics' is a bit vague.   Also, I think it will result in even less entries than usual. 

Also - I am leaving for vacation tomorrow and will be gone for a week.  This voting is already kind of a cluster f*ck, so I'm going to hold off on trying to figure it out until I get back.  If you guys come to some consensus on what to do while I'm gone, I'm fine with whatever is decided.

1. RPG

2. Technology

3. Folklore and Mythology

I consider an "interesting game mechanic" to be any use of bonus structure/factories that goes beyond the standard continent bonus system found in the original game.

I tried to capture the votes so far in this spreadsheet:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AjtIsJkyopekdDBLZW9wRldyRS1aRXpFcE1jNHAxanc&usp=sharing

It should be editable by anyone with the link, so feel free to add your votes while I'm gone.