piecepack programming mechanics

["Troy Holaday" <tholaday@...>]

I tried to send this earlier and it was bounced because of a server problem.  If it hits the list twice, sorry.

Some ideas.

1.  Place a coin under the robot-pawn.  I don't have an 'industry made' piecepack system, so I don't know how big the base of your pawns are in relation to the coins.  If they are the same size, this won't work, but if they aren't, perhaps the direction indicator would show.  Not a great solution, but the only one I can think of without adding something to the system.

2.  Your ideas seem sound for translating the roborally type mechanics.  I would like to add a mechanics suggestion about revealing instructions.  I am working on a game of my own right now that has a string-type bit of information discretely set up by one player at the start of the game.  (No it's NOT a Mastermind clone.)  I use a stacking method with the coins.  The string is built bottom up, with reversed coins to indicate certain things.  The point is, you could either reveal the string one piece at a time by flipping coins off the top, or by picking up the whole stack and dropping one coin off the bottom at a time while moving to the right (better, I think).  In this way players could hide/stack their instructions, then put a cap on them with another coin to keep prying eyes off the first bit of data until everyone is ready to 'show their hands.'

Troy Holaday
Assistant Director of Academic Systems
Ball State University
Muncie, IN 47306
(765) 285-3936
(765) 285-2082 - fax