What would you like to see for PW?

[Justin]

Have you guys checked out the alternate modes of play in the pattern book?

[vagen]

I would love to see encounter cards, as someone who plays a lot of board games the weird effects for a round would be awesome.

Puppet terrain features inspired by Malifaux. Such as the hanging tree, witches hut. or rules for the various terrain effects. While it would add a level of complexity it could still be pretty fun.

I think a modular playing surface would be great especially if we could go to 5 or 6 players.

Obviously more puppets.

It may be to late, but I'd love for the effigies to have puppet wars stat cards in their boxes so they could be used in either game.

I'm curious about avatars (puppetars?) if they would even work in puppet wars.

New kinds of terrain, or on board items, such as health kits etc. (one of the things my group does is we choose a couple of unused puppets and place a odds & ends marker. Any puppet adjacent to the counter can take (1) interact to gather a piece of scrap from the pile. i.e. choose one of the upgrades to add to their scrap pile.)

Also possibly a board with slightly larger squares. On the existing one if you get a lot of puppets scruming up in the middle it's hard to move some of them without dinging the others. Especially in larger games with more people, we tend to use a battle mat or Heroscape terrain in these instances but the regular board is so nice it's a shame not to use it.

[Pierowmaniac]

I actually think the game could do with being a bit more simplified (probably at the puppet end) before any additionaly effects and terrain etc are added.

I think the game seems to be closer to a wargame than a board game at the minute.

Don't get me wrong I love it, but trying to get my fiancee to play it, she just takes one look at all the rules and stat cards and she not interested. whilst she will play games such as 'dwarf kings hold'. Her words 'its just to much like the big games you play'

[karn987]

I will start off by saying that I am a little biased in my opinion, but I have been waiting for a game like Puppet Wars to come out for a very long time. I don't know anyone that has watched Star Wars and seen the chess scene and not gone "wow, that would be cool!" Puppet Wars is like Malifaux chess. Everything may start out on Zoraida's workbench, but thematically I don't think it is a huge step that the citizens of Malifaux would embrace a board game about fighting puppets. For many, the masters of Malifaux are already seen as kings and queens and their henchmen as pawns. I digress, but my overall point and the point of my suggestions, is that Malifaux is a great world and where a lot of things fit and as such, I would really like to see Wyrd embrace some cross promotion of games.

With that premise, here are things I would love to see:

1. More Puppets: The themes, art, and mechanics are already done in Malifaux. It would be crazy to not work them into Puppet Wars. Plus, people initially are going to want to take their favorite Malifaux crew into Puppet wars and vise versa. Besides, more puppets equal more options and more options equal more fun.

2. Puppet Theme Boxes: As a miniature game, people are going to want to customize what they play with. Other people have hit it right on the head. Theme boxes would allow people to get the extras they want and lower the start up cost for a new player. I will state it again, initally people are going to want to see a translation of their Malifaux crew. There is no reason not to promote that until players learn the benefits of drawing from all the puppets. Starting with a theme box provides those fun moments where a new player can go up against something they don't have and if they like it, go an buy that theme box.

3. 3D Terrain, Modular Boards, Bigger Hexes: The benifits of 3D terrain has already been talked about, they look great and alot of people (like myself) have looked into building their own. I'd also love to see some other terrian types. Modular boards promote innovation, as sizes and shapes of the game can be changed. Bigger hexes promote 3D terrain and modular systems, but they also have the benefit of cross promotion. Bigger hexes mean bigger models will fit into them, which means Malifaux models will fit. Now a new or experienced Malifaux player can take his crew directly into a game of Puppet Wars. It is a lot easier to justify some extra purchases for your Puppet War game or you Malifaux crew if it can pull extra duty. It is also a lot easier to sucked into buying another batch of modles :-) For the people that have been looking to a solution for individual models, you have it while not needing to increase your SKU numbers.

4. Schemes of Event Deck: One of the greatest things Wyrd did is came up with games that promoted something other than kill your opponent until they are dead. Adding schemes to Puppet Wars adds a lot of depth to the game and promotes some of the best mechanics of Wyrd's other game. Puppet Wars can do a lot as a gateway game into Malifaux mechanics. The opposite can be said of Malifaux being a gateway into Puppet Wars. The idea being that you already have card draw combat, why not include objective/scheme based things to make transitioning between the games more seemless.

5. Promotion of Variant Game Types: While my other suggestions have purposefully been to cross promote Puppet Wars with Malifaux, it is the ability to adopt different game modes that Puppet Wars shines and truely differentiates itself. The mechanics of the scrap pile, workbench spawn points, playing on a game board, all really lend themselves to innovation and adoption of other games that make use of these mechanics. Some examples being:

a) Capture the Flag: Grab a marker and run it back to a base. Infinite spawns, workbenches work as spawn points. (Inspired by WoW battle grounds)

Take and hold: Similar to Capture the Flag but based on turns you can control an objective(s) getting you points

c) DOTA / League of Legends Inspired: Any model killed drops stuffing counters which can be picked up by models. All models get the ability to use their action to teleport back to a workbench and turn in their stuffing counters for upgrades. Once a workbench is taken, it is destroyed. When all of an opponents workbenches are destroyed the game ends. Maybe toss in some random neutral puppets that drop buffs or can be killed for extra stuffing.

d) Puppet Ball / Football / Soccer: Similar to capture the flag, but with rules for throwing/passing the counter. Heck, with a couple of quick rules you could have a game that could compare to Bloodbowl. Require a certian number of puppets on the "line." Any puppet reduced to zero stitches is "knocked down" and can't do anything until healed. All puppets heal back to full at the end of a turn. Maybe include rules that you can spend a stitch to disengage or a stitch to move an additional square.

e) PvE: I would love to see some rule about Puppet vs. Environment games. Very funny idea about a bunch of puppets fighting a Cat or a Rat.

In the end, the sum of these ideas is to get some sort of official promotion of a game type that the community could potentially go nuts with.

I think this sums up a lot of my most immediate ideas. I'm sure I'll add more as I come up with them. Sorry about the wall of text.

Hey, I am personally a huge fan of walls'o'text

Good thoughts and glad your enjoying the game! Same to everyone, great ideas and keep them rolling. We are actually reading this and considering what you say, so type away!