Melting, Sliding Dice

Before I get to number #9 on my list of Games That Make Me Love Games, I'd like to clarify something. My article on Jaipur last week was slightly hyperbolic. Obviously, there are other light strategy games that, like Jaipur, are wonderful for casual social situations. My argument was meant to be more "I love this game and here's something interesting about it" than "This game is the best at what it does and that's why I love it." A fine distinction, perhaps, but I think an important one. This is not meant to be a definitive list of the best games ever, but rather an introduction to my tastes and design interests. That's especially worth noting now, because today's article is very design-focused. If you like it, I suggest checking out this one by Jon Shafer, which was a big inspiration to me.

#9 - Alien Frontiers

At the core of every strategy game is a tension between control and chaos. By definition, a strategy game is one where player action directs outcomes. The big moments in the game, those that end up deciding the winner and losers, need to be player-controlled. If victory relies on simple luck, your choices feel hollow and any sense of strategy disappears. However, games where all outcomes are predictable preclude the possibility of comebacks, upsets and surprises. My favourite games are those that show an understanding of this tension and know when to give players control and when to take it away. They let me create a vague outline of a strategy which gets filled in as the game progresses and shifts focus when necessary.

I love Alien Frontiers because of how it puts this tension front and centre. Every aspect of the design encourages – or forces – players to change their strategies as they compete to colonize a newly discovered planet. On any given turn, there may be an optimal move, but it's impossible to predict what next turn's optimal move will be, meaning that players are constantly thrown out of any ruts they might fall into. The game's insistence that every turn should require me to re-evaluate my goals – as well as those of my opponents – keeps it tense and exciting every time I play. 

At the most basic level, Alien Frontiers is a “worker placement” game. This system, common in many European-style games, is one where every available action is represented on the board. To take an action you place a “worker” on its space, blocking or restricting your opponents from using it. It's an appealing mechanic, because you can always see the options available to you and your opponents. For the same reason, it can allow players to optimize their play too easily, creating dull, predictable strategies. Alien Frontiers sidesteps this issue by replacing your static “workers” with dice. At the beginning of your turn, you roll your dice and the results determine which actions are available to you. Some actions require higher or lower values, doubles, triples or runs. Maybe you wanted to get a bunch of resources or buy more dice or steal from your opponents, but if you didn't get the right roll, you're out of luck. This makes the game inherently dynamic: from turn to turn, you can't predict what you'll be doing, so you have to learn to roll with the punches. The action spaces are smartly designed to make useless rolls as unlikely as perfect ones, encouraging players to creatively use the actions available to them. Even if you build a plan at the game's outset, you still need to be actively thinking throughout the game.

All this dice placement is done in service of your overall goal of placing colonies on Planet Maxwell. The more colonies you've got on the planet, the more victory points you earn. However, almost as important as earning points is controlling territories. If you have more colonies in a territory than any other player, you gain that territory's special ability. These are powerful bonuses that make the various action spaces more effective, giving the players who possess them a powerful advantage. Entire strategies revolve around these abilities, since they are a source of certainty in a game with so little. But they are also fragile. Lose your majority in a territory and you lose its bonus power, forcing you to either commit resources to regain it or drastically change your strategy. Once again, the balance between control and chaos is present: a territory's power gives you control, at the risk of bringing more chaos down on your head should you lose it. Determining when to stand your ground and when to retreat is an important decision that, like the dice placement, gives every turn its own texture and its own strategic weight.

Finally, there are Alien Tech cards, which add another dimension to the delicate balance of Alien Frontiers. These are cards that confer more special abilities: moving dice around, changing their values, protection from theft. They offer players another shield against the randomness of the dice. Didn't get the 6 you wanted? Well, if you've got the right card, you can pay to get it. They are a valuable strategic tool, allowing you more control to optimize your play. However, each card also has a game-changing secondary power: swap colonies around, lock down a territory, destroy an opponents die. To use this power, you must discard the card. Thus, you're constantly pressed with the question of whether you want to sacrifice long-term predictability for short term benefit. The secondary powers allow you to secure your position on the board, but by their very nature that make you less secure in other ways. They're another example of how Alien Frontiers never wants you to get too comfortable, forcing you to constantly change your approach as the game state demands it.

My most hated sentence at the gaming table is “I do the same thing I did last turn.” No game should ever encourage a player to say, think or hear that sentence. A game dies as soon as it allows players to go on auto-pilot. The reason I love Alien Frontiers so much is that it's a master class on how to avoid this problem while keeping players invested in the long-term consequences of their choices. Things fluctuate so quickly – colonies move, powers change hands, points are won and lost – that the right move last turn is rarely the right move now. Victory requires careful evaluation of the game state each and every turn. However, it still matters which territories I decide to target, or which resources I acquire, or when I use my Alien Tech abilities. My opponents and I are still the driving force, but the game throws enough obstacles in our way to stop keep things interesting. Alien Frontiers is not the only game with this dynamic, but the explicitness of its approach serves as a reminder that awareness of the tension between control and chaos is one of the most important parts of any game design.

Last time: #10 - Jaipur 

Next time: #8 - Battle Line