Co-op?

[Otylia]

Let me start by saying I'm am super excited to see how the campaign rules play out in Wave 3.  It was hearing that those rules were coming (in addition to really awesome models) that drew me into Malifaux over other skirmish games.

 

That said.... There's one more thing I'd love to see happen for all of my table top/gaming desires to be met.

The potential for co-op battles.

 

So I thought I'd start up this thread and see if any one had any thoughts on how feasible it would be (I'm thinking maybe along the lines of what the D&D board games was fitted with the D&D encounter mechanics), if other people would be interested in seeing it, etc.  I think it works fluff-wise too since bigger things are happening in the world, and we've already seen stories from book one of groups needing to band together to fight larger "boss" enemies. 

 

[zFiend]

It would be really cool!

[Justin]

It would be really cool!

 

Agreed.

[zFiend]

Agreed.

Haha, you are such a tease sometimes.

[Kapten Vendetta]

 

 I think it works fluff-wise too since bigger things are happening in the world, and we've already seen stories from book one of groups needing to band together to fight larger "boss" enemies. 

 

I like this idea, perhaps there could be an end boss, like, a large gorilla, maybe Cojos father...he could be throwing barrels around, and once he's thrown enough of 'em a Whiskey Golem appears. Perhaps a sewer-dweller like Hamelin might appear, dressed in a fancy new work suit and sporting a moustache?

 

 

[Fetid Strumpet]

I would love the idea if it could be done well. I have great concerns that it could be however. The issue is the A.I. that would need to be implemented, which, in a game like Malifaux, I doubt could be done well. I've yet to play a good co-op game where the A.I. is all that satisfying to play against. And I play a lot of Co-Op games as they are the only game my other half prefers to play.

 

The only games I think that do it well are the sort of Co-Ops where 1 person plays against everyone else, and those often suffer from the problem that of the the "enemy" player often has to treat the game like a RPG and not actually really, honestly try to win, which, to me, if I have to do that, I'd rather go play an actual RPG.

[Otylia]

Fetid - The 1 person against everyone else is what I was hoping to avoid, otherwise the game would have to have more than two players, at which point I'd probably prefer to go with TTB lol.  Have you and your wife/husband tried the D&D board game?  It allows somewhat of a bypass to AI by randomizing encounters.  I could see something like that working for Malifaux too, maybe along these lines...

 

Set up a board with a centralized objective, similar to some of the story-driven scenarios.

You could even randomize deployment - do both teams start on the same side, have to meet in the middle, etc.

As you advance to the center of the board, have some sort of flip to see if you encounter a minor enemy.  Maybe have it so each character within 2 inches of cover terrain has to flip or something, and have that enemy immediately be engaged with that character.  It would  force you to strategize who you wanted as "scouts" and how you wanted to progress your team through the board.

Then once you reach the center you come across the main boss - An out of control mechanical creation, a massive creature coming through a breach... Bad things happen.  You get the idea.

There would have to be some sort of rules given on how the minor enemies and boss would behave once engaged of course.  As I type this I wonder if maybe existing models could be used for minor enemies, and maybe flips could be used to see which of his attacks are utilized? And I'm not sure how cheating fate would work against an NPC like that... and I'm sure there's plenty of bugs that I'm not thinking of.  But that's the first mechanics that came to mind.

[Fetid Strumpet]

The D&D board games I lump into games where I found the A.I. extremely unsatisfying, and the experience of playing the game very ephemeral and shallow. I'm not denigrating anyone who enjoys them, but that's the thing. Board game A.I.s are so limited because you are relying on players to keep track of it, so it can't be complex, and it can't really make the players have to make meaningful choices. I mean even the movement mechanic in Arkham Horror, which is really simple and pretty clever, is a pain to deal with once you have any number of monsters on the board. And because you are limited to extremely simple interactions, so the players can keep track of it, it always seems to come down to "random wacky chance" to me, which is ok in it's place, but I personally don't feel like setting up an elaborate game, for it to come down to random encounters, easily out thought A.I., and wacky stuff. At that point I could just shuffle a deck of cards, deal half out to the other player, and just play a game of WAR. It would have as much satisfaction, and have way less effort to set up and play.

 

Which is why the only Co-Op games I've personally ever found enjoyable are ones where multiple people play against someone else, because then at least all the "enemy" mechanics are being taken care of by one person, and there is actual focused intelligence guiding the actions of the enemies, so that the shared experience of overcoming the challenge is actually worthwhile.

 

If I were to play a game where the goal is to beat an out of control construct, and I move up and then flip a card for a random encounter, already that makes it less fun for me because if we were to play it again, what if I don't get a random encounter, what if it was easier, what if it was harder? At base in such a system there is really no way to evaluate how you are playing the game, or if there are any skills you need to improve on, or focus less on, it's just, whoops today we faced a student of steel, and yesterday nothing got in our way on the path to take down the Valedictorian. And if you divorce skill from the experience, you take away a lot of at least to me why I would even bother playing a game. I mean such an experience is basically akin to playing one of the varieties of Munckin, which don't get me wrong, can be enjoyable, but it isn't for the game itself, and certainly not for repeated plays in short succession.

 

If you are just playing the game to pass the time I feel that there are better systems and better experiences to be had that will deliver the same thing, but in better ways, with less work. That's my personal opinion though, and I don't denigrate anyone who feels differently. Believe me I would love a Co-Op version of Malifaux, but if it was basically down to just randomness, frankly I'll pass as it wouldn't be worth my time.

[Otylia]

I would agree that some elements of AI are definitely lacking... although I do think that's going to be a barrier on any full co-op venture unfortunately.

 

As far as the complete randomization of enemies, in a lot of ways I think that's a more genuine experience than most table top skirmishes present where you know every model your opponent is fielding and where they stand on the field every step of the game.  Malifaux goes a step farther to over come this by having opponents declare factions but not crews until they deploy and yes there are models that overcome this with from the shadows and whatnot... but for the most part once deployment is done, a player is still granted an unnatural knowledge of his opponents forces and whereabouts.  I think randomizing encounters actually could be an improvement on this. 

As for not being able to improve/evaluate your performance - what about improving your ability to defend against the unknown?  To advance a crew while protecting weaker characters against POTENTIAL threats, instead of only strategizing to deal with known threats.  And all while needing to keep in mind that you're going to need a certain amount of force to deal with a bigger foe at the end.

I'd be curious if anyone could think of an alternative mechanic though.

 

Not saying that coop would be for everyone, because yes, certain levels of strategy and opponent intellect will be lacking... but I still think it could offer value and advantages on top of variety. 

[Jewomie]

So, how does the University of Transmortis solo game work? is there any reason that the idea of how the enemies work couldn't be applied to a co-op strat?

I don't own the set, and have never seen the rule book, so I don't know how it works, so I might be WAY off base here.

Also, I had a thought based on one of the old Halloween encounters from years ago. the idea was the both crews were in a large building in the center of the table, and outside you had endless waves of mindless zombies walking toward the house. The movement was pretty easy, the Zombies always moved toward the door/windows, or they would move toward a player's model. If they got into range of either thing, they attacked it. The zombies were controlled just like normal minis after the player models had all activated. so I would do one, you would do the next, and so on and so forth until there were no zombies left.

Meanwhile, the crews could board up windows (easier now with interact actions) and kill any zombies that made it inside. They were still competing, but it had a level of co-op to it because you didn't want the zombies to get inside.

Just a thought. I have no idea if these scenarios are out there in the internet space somewhere or not, but I have given a good deal of though of how to update this encounter for a Halloween event I'm putting together this year, so I thought about it when I saw your post.

[solkan]

Hmm.  From playing some of the zombie board games, zombies have a really useful plot element going for them:  We expect the zombies to be dumb, so it's perfect that the zombies operate according to simple (and exploitable) rules like "Go towards the loudest survivors, even if you get stuck in a dead end." 

 

Otherwise, the game designer ends up with the dilemma of finding the balance between writing a simple strategy that's going to be occasionally very, very bad; or asking the players to alternate between trying to figure out how to win (when they're taking their turn) and trying to figure out how to cause themselves to lose (when they're running the non-player models).

[Mason]

I think that Super Dungeon Explore: Forgotten King has a pretty good AI mechanic in its Arcade Mode. They made separate cards for Arcade Mode, and then have a deck of cards with commands that enemies following, attacking the players that have the most aggro (or the player with the most aggro within range). In a way, it really captures the old Everquest aggro system pretty well, and it makes npc turns go quickly on the tabletop.

[PraetorDragoon]

Personally, I prefer to play Co-op games against an AI or other automated system rather than another player. Mainly because if I went to play against another player, what would be the point of co-op?

[Fetid Strumpet]

Have you tried Forgotten king yet Mason? Aside from a few scattered reviews about the system that are positive the overwhelming amount of reviews about that A.I. is that it isn't very good and it's the weakest aspect of that game. I haven't played it yet, so YMMV, but many reviewers that I tend to pay attention to just don't think it's a very good system.

 

Just curious as to why you think it's good if you've played it. Most reviewers I've read think its just too random and non-sensical.

[Dejavu]

If you wanted to implement interesting AI for the enemies then I think you could draw inspiration from zombicide, where a card is flipped each turn which determines what happens (simplifying a lot here as I only want to draw part of the idea).

This would be quite appropriate for malifaux as card mechanics are already built in, there could be a custom deck for controlling the boss. This could determine things number & types of actions, could give different bonus conditions for the turn, have pulse effects that trigger, terrain effects (like lava effects for cherufe).

Alternatively this could all just be determined by a normal fate decks and have something like the number determining actions to take, and the suit triggering all the extras (or vice versa). This would have the advantage that the same deck could be used for damage flips.

A concern I have is that the boss can't cheat fate, which would mean players could have quite an advantage over him, unless his stats are higher, I could see balancing his as problematic.

I think this is a great idea, and could be a good source for special edition models allowing people to play a fun single player game on their own or a co-op game.

[Mason]

Have you tried Forgotten king yet Mason? Aside from a few scattered reviews about the system that are positive the overwhelming amount of reviews about that A.I. is that it isn't very good and it's the weakest aspect of that game. I haven't played it yet, so YMMV, but many reviewers that I tend to pay attention to just don't think it's a very good system.

 

Just curious as to why you think it's good if you've played it. Most reviewers I've read think its just too random and non-sensical.

 

Yup, I picked it up at Origins and have been having a blast with it.

 

For the most part, it's a pretty good system. The cards generally have the creatures moving towards the character with the most Wrath (read: aggro) and then attacking the player with the most wrath in their range, but some cards (i.e., Griefer) have them sudden shift their attention to the player with the least Wrath. Other cards tweak things one way or other other, such as Hardcore, which spawns new monsters and then sends them to attack, or Lag, which only lets the monsters attack (but not move).

 

For me, at least, it really invokes the nostalgia of playing old-school MMOs like Everquest. You can manipulate the aggro mechanic to your advantage...but that's sort of the point, I think.

 

 

Will a game be better with an actual player controlling the monsters? Well, duh. That's true of pretty much any game. However, I think that FK does a pretty great job of having a workable AI mechanic that never feels clunky or cumbersome. Sometimes the monsters spaz out and do stupid stuff...but if you've ever played an MMO and laughed as a monster with bad pathing ran halfway around the zone to get to you, I think you'll find it more charming than frustrating.

 

 

 

Malifaux-related note: Brotherhood of the Rat has a single-player scenario that people will hopefully enjoy.

[LordZombie]

I made a campaign based on that idea. 

 

The thing with AI is that players are always going to be able to game the AI. If you want to do that, then fine, but then what is the point of playing? I see making AI rules for models in Malifaux would be the easiest as you have a deck of cards to work with. My gaming group is pretty small so co op games have always been on my mind. Maybe it is about time to return to my old campaign. 

[Chriscdoa]

Love this idea. Also like idea of using campaign rules. Start with 10-20ss. Gain ss depending on win conditions. Spend on more models etc like with campaign. Just he agreed missions before, or use story encounters and basic enemy Ai.

Maybe flip for Ai mode.

 aggressive - attack with best option.

buff, summon, create markers

 stealth - move away, flank.

 scheme - defend schemes or place markers.

 

Think this could work great.

 

[Chriscdoa]

Well i tried a very simple session with the Wife to intro the rules. it went well, so well that I Don't think i'll get her to play a proper game as she would rather play co-op than versus.

Henchmen + 20ss. I had Ototo, Archer, Brother and Torakage. She had Candy, teddy and Wicked Dolls. (basically she picked the pictures she liked from book, luckily i had some of the models!!)

4x4 6" terraclips tiles giving us 4 lanes. 3 altars in left, middle and right. We started bottom corners, and had a sewer at top of board. At start of each turn we flipped for each lane.

Weak =1 mindless zombie, moderate =2, severe =3...but 4,5,6,7 gave us a better zombie based on SS cost (canine remains, crooked, flesh construct, punk)

we then alternated activations with zombies going 3rd and rolling a dice for which lane moved first, with zombies heading down the lane until in charge distance. For a choice of attack we rolled.

1 VP for each zombi-free altar scheme marker at end of turn, and 1VP to player who killed most zombies.

Turn 1 we both scored 1 for centre altar (i almost didnt, a zombie stood next to it) and she got the zombie VP

Turn 2 she got a 2nd altar (which she said gave her +2VP and i didn't argue), but i got the zombie bonus. 3-3.

Turn 3 i got a second altar, but somehow missed third, and she got zombie kills (about 7 that turn) for a 6-5 win.

It was good fun. Teddy would have done a lot more but got stuck on flank fighting spawning zombies. Candy was obscene. Using the fears upgrade to make zombies just die on poor def flips. 

Considered using the campaign rules to carry on but think we may just pick different crews and do something different.

[SpiralngCadavr]

On 7/9/2015 at 2:02 PM, Jewomie said:

So, how does the University of Transmortis solo game work? is there any reason that the idea of how the enemies work couldn't be applied to a co-op strat?

Frankly, it was pretty disappointing. It took me about 10 minutes looking at it to figure out how to play, and how to exploit it. Then I tried (and confirmed) it because I was bored.

The Nothing Beast (of all things) had the right abilities and stats to tank it out from all four while the rest of my crew did what needed doing. The AI was neither smart nor highly-statted enough to be a challenge.

[LordZombie]

This is more for @Chriscdoa, but everyone can use it. A Zombicide based campaign I made once. With the new campaign rules, I should update it. Enjoy

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B1rZsoaHFuNoZWZuNWhDbVkwYjg&usp=sharing 

[Chriscdoa]

On 20/04/2016 at 9:46 PM, LordZombie said:

This is more for @Chriscdoa, but everyone can use it. A Zombicide based campaign I made once. With the new campaign rules, I should update it. Enjoy

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B1rZsoaHFuNoZWZuNWhDbVkwYjg&usp=sharing 

This is really cool. thanks