In-setting dice and board game design brainstorming

[Illogictree]

Hello, everyone. First time posting in a thread outside of a game since moving to the new site, hope this is the right place to post this sort of thing!

So I have been working on a setting, and to flesh out the cultures within I had the thought to create a couple of games that the people of that world play. I've got rough outlines of the games and how they work, but I thought I would see if there are any further suggestions and ideas that people can think of. Also, feel free to talk about any games you've made up to be played in your own settings.

 

The game that I'm most interested in developing is what I'm calling at the moment "Storyteller's Gambit". It's something like a combination of yahtzee, commedia dell'arte, and tarot, meant to be very old in-setting and a cultural touchstone that's made its way into many different lands, each putting a slightly different spin on it. People of all social classes play it and it's a rich source of metaphor and symbolism for them.

The basic idea is as such: players take turns rolling sets of specialized dice that have various symbols representing iconic story elements on each side, then try to tell an improvised story using the elements presented to them.

The elements, places, and characters on the dice are iconic and archetypal, but part of the interest is that they are open to interpretation, and a creative storyteller using the elements in unusual but still recognizable ways is welcome. For instance, the Sword can represent a literal sword, or more broadly a weapon, or can be used more figuratively to represent harsh words in an argument or the concept of conflict or conflict resolution itself.

I've had an idea that, as the four Aristotlean elements are important in the setting (although influenced by non-Western interpretations of such elemental systems), the dice are cast onto a board divided into four quadrants corresponding to each element and the dice that land in each quadrant have to be influenced somehow by that element (with those landing outside the quadrants in 'the void' having a supernatural influence).

Now, the application of this game to fortune-telling is obvious, but I have to assume that any game with such elements of randomness probably has some form of gambling arise around it, which may imply some sort of 'scoring' of the rolls and the storytelling linking them together, although I'm at a loss as to how to begin designing such a system.

Also, I am not sure how the dice would actually be structured - like would there be a die specifically holding "place" symbols, one specifically holding "item" symbols, two for "characters"? Or would a mix of symbol types on each dice be better? I have a few ideas for story elements that could be represented - the Hero, the Lover, the Sword, the Fox Woman (the setting's archetypal wise woman/trickster, akin to Baba Yaga), the Mire - and further ideas for story elements, particularly ones that could have multiple or abstract interpretations, would be appreciated.

 

The second game is a little more fleshed out, and I think it'll mostly be down to actually making and playtesting it to see if it works like I think it should. I'm including this because I think it might be of further interest. Mostly it's borne out of my frustration about fictional chess analogues being basically different flavors of fairy chess (or even literally just chess with the piece names changed), so I took inspiration from tafl and "Thud" (invented for Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels).

Like chess, it is an abstraction of warfare in the setting - warfare that includes giant magitech mecha. These robots, called "dragoons", are powerful but have vulnerabilities that can be exploited by foot soldiers.

It is played on a grid, with two types of pieces for each player in symmetrical teams: the smaller and more numerous pieces representing soldiers, and larger fewer pieces representing dragoons.

Pieces can move in all 8 directions, with soldiers moving 1 space (like chess kings) and dragoons moving farther (either up to 3 spaces or just moving like chess queens, haven't solidified this and should be playtested).

Dragoons can just take all enemy pieces, but they have to stop movement when they take a piece.

Soldiers can take enemy soldiers, but to take an enemy dragoon they have to box it in. This of course is easier at the edges of the board.

The win condition is eliminating your opponent's pieces or placing them in a position where they have to surrender.

In-setting it occupies a similar cultural cachet as chess, in that it's played by intellectuals and wise commanders to demonstrate that they understand tactics and can create and execute plans. Although it can be played by just about anyone, all you need is different-sized and colored rocks and a patch of dirt to draw a grid on, but more elaborate sets are made with more detailed models. The most elaborate use miniatures made in the likenesses of historical military figures and famous dragoons, and some wealthy individuals even collect such models.

 

Anyway, those are my current ideas, I'd appreciate some feedback and ideas to help improve these games. And if you guys have thought about games being played in your own settings, I'd like to hear about them!