Tabletop Mechanics -- Uncertainty

• Betting and Bluffing - Players commit a stake of currency or resources to purchase a chance of winning everyone’s stake, based on some random outcome like being dealt a superior set of cards or rolling a higher number.

  • Players can bluff by representing through their in-game actions that they hold a stronger position than they do.
  • Players can fold or quit the contest and limit their losses to whatever they had already staked.
  • Players can challenge another player’s position. If the challenged player wasn’t bluffing, the challenger suffers a penalty. Otherwise, the bluffer suffers a penalty.
  • When a player makes a challenge, uncertainty exists only based upon player actions.
  • A key design element in this is that players having partial information about the game state. They do, however, have some form of conveying information.
  • It can also be incorporated in combat resolution mechanics where players have a hidden amount of strength. With this system, players commit a certain amount of strength and can perform bluffing, folding, and challenging as normal.
  • It encourages Yomi - out-reading and out-guessing an opponent.

• Push Your Luck - Players must decide between settling for existing gains and risking them all for further rewards.

  • Push-Your-Luck is a type of wager in which players have less control over the ante or the stakes
  • An important dynamic in push-your-luck games is how changes to the stakes can alter player behavior. When players have nothing to lose (i.e., when the game encourages risk taking), players are more likely to push their luck.
  • Push-Your-Luck as a mechanism is straightforward to understand, even if the risks can be difficult to calculate, and it easily creates drama, tension, and excitement

• Memory - Hidden, trackable information whose tracking gives players an advantage

  • On one hand, games can test if players can remember things.
  • On the other hand, games can have hidden trackable information. In these games, memory is not a core mechanic but gives an advantage.
  • Memory and HTI sharply reduce accessibility and inclusion.
  • In many non-memory games, memory can still give an advantage to players.

• Hidden Roles - One or more players are assigned differing roles that are not publicly revealed at the start of the game.

  • Social Deduction Games are those where the object is to deduce the allegiances of the players. Typically in these games, only one team faces uncertainty.
  • Traitor Games have some other win condition besides revealing the allegiances of players. In these games, the traitor, upon discovery, shifts to a different role.
  • Competing Roles - players are not on fixed teams and have hidden identities, but revealing those identities is not directly tied to winning or losing
  • Any game with this as a mechanic requires some form of hidden resolution system to preserve anonymity. There must be some moderator.
  • In social deduction games, especially, uncertainty comes from conversations between players as this gives them the chance to lie.
  • Voting-based player elimination is very common in social deduction games, and that mechanism can create negative social consequences. Players need to understand the bounds of the the magic circle.

• Roles with Asymmetric Information - One or more players are secretly assigned roles at the start of the game which has different win conditions and receives different starting information about the game state.

  • The social dynamic of being the only person not in the know creates pressure, tension, and the possibility for humor—often at one player’s expense.
  • This technique is not limited to competitive games.

• Communication Limits - Games may limit players from communicating with one another openly. These restrictions can be absolute as they relate to certain specific pieces of information, or they may restrict certain types of communication, such as speaking

  • In cooperative games or games with intra-team cooperation, communication limits operate to make the game more difficult
  • In the absence of specific rules of what information can be shared, playgroups are left to manage themselves. This can lead to a dynamic where players play with an open hand.

• Unknown Information - Aspects of the game state are unknown to all players but lie within a known range.

  • Unknown Information creates uncertainty during any given play of a game and creates variety in repeated plays

• Hidden Information - Aspects of the game state are hidden from all but one or a few players.

  • This includes two types of information — those kept explicitly hidden from others (i.e., a secret goal), and those which can be deduced (i.e., knowing who has a unique card).
  • Once players understand what the range of the hidden information is, they can try to deduce what it is from players who know it
  • It allows for bluffing.

• Probability Management - A mechanism which allows players to influence the probabilities of certain outcomes but not directly determine them.

  • At its most direct, players can gain dice modifier tokens that allow them to add or subtract from the value of a die or card.
  • This is also very evident in deck building games. The act of building the deck serves as a probability management mechanism.

• Variable Setup - The starting game state varies from game to game, through changes to shared game components like the map, and/or changes to starting player setups, resources, objectives, etc.

  • Variable setup is tied to but not the same as replayability. Replayability is more tied to the core experience of the game being different each time.
  • In many cases, variable setups don’t impact uncertainty once the setup is complete, because nothing that happens in the game is probabilistically dependent on setup
  • Some variable setups incorporate hidden or unknown information
  • Designers need to be careful that randomized setups don’t create balance issues. This is particularly true in longer games

• Hidden Control - Players have hidden influence on locations or characters, which they reveal to perform actions.

  • Play is divided up between assigning influence and either declaring or spending that influence to trigger the effects of the character or location in question.

• Deduction - Reasoning by process of elimination to discover a crucial piece of information

  • Deduction games come in a variety of structures
    • Most deduction games have a central mystery that all players are trying to solve.
    • Other games have a puzzlemaster, one player who knows the solution and one or more players solving the puzzle. The puzzlemaster can be oppositional, supportive, or neutral.
    • Each player may be solving their own personal puzzle
    • Sometimes players are both puzzlemasters trying to prevent the other from solving a puzzle they’re charged with defending while simultaneously racing to solve another puzzle
  • A key consideration in their design, is in the choice of affordances that are provided to the players to track their deduction process
  • Attenuating the effectiveness of pure reasoning will make a game lighter and less competitively balanced.

• Induction - Players attempt to determine the rules governing a situation.

  • Typically, a game master creates a hidden rule. Players then create a pattern or play a game element and are told by the game master whether that matches the rule.
  • Induction is distinguished from deduction by:
    • Having open ended rules
    • Players make guesses. They are only told if they fit or don’t fit the rule.
  • The crux of induction games is the creation of the rule. There is a small sweet spot of a satisfying rule that players are gradually able to zero in on versus an obscure rule that only leads to a long, frustrating play experience.
  • The designer also needs to consider how guesses are made. Unbounded guesses do not automatically translate to complexity

• Questions and Answers - Players ask and answer questions in a manner constrained by rules. Questions can be used in a few ways.

  • Questions gather information
    • These games require close ended questions with clear structure and answer.
    • Ideally no ambiguity should exist in whether a question can be asked and what the answer must be.
    • The designer must take care to make the rules clear. Players cannot ask clarifying questions without spoiling the game.
  • Questions are directly worth points
  • Questions are prompts to encourage player generated content.
    • The dangers here are less from ambiguity and more from potentially creating uncomfortable or dangerous environments

Links §

• Building Blocks of Tabletop Game Design - An Encyclopedia of Mechanisms by Engelstein and Shalev