New Rules! I’ve played a lot more multi-player games since I last worked on Dragon Duel. One of the things that people have been observing during playtesting all along is that despite it’s name, Dragon Duel makes a very engaging 3-4 person game. The only problem is, it’s easy to get killed off early and have to sit out. But not anymore. Here is my original take on some end-game rules where dragons stick around instead of dying.

Instead of being eliminated, a dragon with zero or fewer life remaining becomes the minion of dragon who defeated them, known hereafter as the dragon’s master. The minion dragon keeps its last life card face up in front of it. Should the minion dragon gain 1 or more life it becomes its own master again.

• Minions cannot attack their masters.
• Minions attack other dragons, but with a -1 penalty.
• If a minion defeats another dragon, that dragon also becomes a minion of the same master.
• If a minion takes any damage, the dragon who did the damage becomes that minion’s new master.

Since writing the above rules we have played with them a few times and found them lacking. I’m toying with several possible mechanics, but the key decisions appear to be deciding how much control of their fate a Minion should have, and how much influence they should have on the remainder of the game. These decisions may be made by simple trial and error. Give a Minion the possibility of regaining control and see what happens. I’d like to experiment with increased interaction between Master and Minion, as well as increased control over the Minions behavior. I don’t know where it’ll go, but I know this idea is headed in the right direction.

Comments are open. Please toss your ideas into the mix.

Fast forward to 2006, Dragon Duel is back in action. Josh from work introduced me to Looney Labs, that “that hippie game company”, so I’ve seen a whole new take on game design and rules presentation. The rules sheet for Early American Chrononauts was particularly inspiring in it’s non-linear approach to teaching rules. I have attempted to emulate them in this, my latest version of the Dragon Duel rules. The text has only the most minor changes, but the presentation is far more visual, emphasizing in-game reference and using varying text sizes to prioritize the information.