BUILDINGS AND CHAMPIONS

Now I needed to build all the buildings and a bunch more champions.

Two areas of the playing field are the same size as a poker card. In the next version of the board, I've slightly enlarged these areas so that cards placed in Ultra Pro Eclipse sleeves fit comfortably on the areas. This is something to consider. The game will probably not be cheap and the players will want to protect their investment. If I can plan this into the game design, I have to do it.

On this picture you can see that a large building and 6 posses (who upgrade the building with their souls) fit exactly on one poker card. It wasn't easy to make a first draft of buildings that stand on these strangely shaped bases and still look good. Like any other model, these will be reworked sooner or later, but I think they're working pretty well so far. Each player will be able to build 4 temples on the earth areas.

On the left you see the Alpha Temple that looks more geometric, and the Omega Temple that looks more organic.

THE CREATION of an experience

Here are the new temples and the cardboard proxies I used to play with. Sometimes I get asked: "Why do you build all these crazy detailed models and don't finish the game mechanics first? Yes, I'm aware that it's a somewhat radical system, but when I think about it I'd have a ready-made game of "cardboard comrades" and then I'd have to start making all the models and all the cards for it... that's more uncomfortable for me than throwing away or reworking things I've already done.

The look of the game is just such an integral part of the game that I always make mechanical decisions based on the look. I mean... A battle of heaven against hell? If it doesn't take place in an appropriate room with an appropriate look, it would be just ridiculous. Right? Right! :D

In the gallery you can also see the temples and a mushroom-like demon building. I think it's very cool to think that demons have something mushroom-like about them, they combine mushroom and flesh and can spread through spores. H.P. Lovecraft style! :D

HUMANS with "Superpowers"

With the champions, I made sure that the characters are a bit "weird", but that you can easily read from them what they will do in the game.

The most extreme one in my opinion is "Tutu" (this is the creature in the fox mask with the naked butt). For this champion I have so far considered an "illusionists" mechanics, but I do not know yet whether it is fun.

I want the champions and their passive abilities to have a big influence on the game. It will be interesting to see how the champions are combined by the players with the different Heaven and Hell monsters.

This month has also been a month of modeling. It's just an incredible amount of work, but I still had enough time to make some dice games with the cat.