Solo: A solitare game for PP -

["david_bruce_cousins" <david.cousins@...>]

Hi,
<RodSerlingVoice>
Submitted for your approval, a solitare game for PP.
</RodSerlingVoice>
I'd love feedback on this one, it may need some polishing, but I think
it has good potential.
It is my first PP game, so be gentle with your feedback (*ouch* hey
stop throwing those tiles).

TIA and TTFN

Dave
----------------8<-------------8<-------------------

Solo
A solitare game for PiecePack
Version 0.1 December 23, 2001
© 2001 by David Bruce Cousins
One player, (?? Minutes)

Summary
=======
Solo is a mix of strategy and luck. By moving your pawns around the
board you pick up coins. The values of the coins determine the
distance of your next move. Aces and Blanks are your friends and foes
as you strive to clear the board of all the coins before your last
pawn gets retired.

Setup
=====
Solo uses ALL the Piecepack pieces.

Pull out the four blank tiles. Shuffle them and lay them down in a
vertical column on the left side of the table. Place the corresponding
colored pawn on each one. These are used to keep track of the coins
that have been discovered during the game. The topmost pawn(furthest
away from you) will be used first, followed by the next closest one
etc.

Shuffle the remaining tiles. Place them face up randomly in a five by
four rectangle (or in one of the other patterns described in the
variants section).

Separate the coins into groups of like colors, number side down and
shuffle the groups. Place the coins in stacks, still number side down
on like color tiles using the following rule: Place two less coins
than the number of the tile (i.e. fives get three coins, fours get two
coins, threes get one coin and the rest of the tiles get no coins).
Note, the suit of the coins and the tiles they are on must match.

Initial free move:
You may now move a number of coins from tiles that have multiple coins
onto an adjacent orthogonal tile that has no coins. It is suggested
that you start with moving four coins total, and increase or reduce
this number to make the game easier or harder. The more empty tiles
there are in the game, the harder it will be to complete. Note, the
moved coins do not have to be the same suit as their new tile. You can
move as many coins as you want from a given stack.

Initial pawn placement.
Gather the four dice together in one hand and randomly choose one.
Roll this dice. The resulting number/color combination determines the
starting tile of the first pawn. If you roll a blank, then you may
choose which tile to start on. Take the pawn which is furthest away
from you from its place in the column and place it on the starting
tile. If the resulting tile has no coins, bum luck, the pawn must be
retired (see below).

The Play:
========

A game turn proceeds as follows:
Take the top coin from the stack on the tile that your pawn is on.
Flip over the coin. One of three actions will result:

*  You reveal a number. This is the number of tiles you must move the
pawn. The pawn may be moved in straight lines along a row or column.
It must be moved the total number of tiles indicated by the coin, and
may make at most one 90 degree turn. Place the coin face up next to
the blank tile of the same color so you can keep track of which coins
have been taken.
Note if you cannot move the pawn to a tile containing at least one
coin, you must move it to an empty tile. The pawn must then be
retired, or rescued with an ace (see below).

*  You reveal a Spiral (ace). Move one tile vertically or
horizontally. Place the ace in front of you. You may use each ace one
additional time to rescue a pawn (see below). You may check the suit
of the ace at any time.

*  You reveal a Blank: Your pawn is retired. It may be rescued if you
have an ace in front of you. Place the blank on the corresponding
blank tile to indicate that that color is now safe!

Retiring pawns:
===============
Once a pawn is retired, the next pawn in the column must enter the
game. The pawn is placed on the tile that corresponds to the new
pawn's color, but with the same number as the tile just occupied by
the newly retired pawn. If the resulting tile has no coins, then the
player may place the pawn on the closest number (higher or lower) of
the pawn's color that contains at least one coin.

Rescuing pawns with a spiral (ace):
===================================
When your pawn must be retired because it uncovers a blank coin, or
because it cannot move to a tile with coins on it, you may rescue that
pawn if you have an ace in front of you. If you choose to rescue the
pawn, you may do one of the following:

1) Stay on the tile or move one tile horizontally or vertically and
continue the turn by flipping the next coin

or

2) Send your pawn to a random location - randomly pick one die and
roll it just like the initial pawn placement (note this becomes more
risky as the board clears out). If the resulting tile is blank, the
pawn must be retired (but can be rescued again if you have another
ace).

Staying on the same tile usually only makes sense when there are more
coins on the tile.

Once you have used an ace to rescue a pawn you must place the ace on
the corresponding blank tile to show that that color's ace has been
used up.

Note: it is not always beneficial to rescue a pawn. See if the next
pawn will enter on a more favorable spot before using up an ace.

Ending the game and scoring:
===========================
Once the last pawn is retired, count the number of coins left on the
board. That is your score. Try to beat it next time by leaving less
coins.

Variants:
========
Toric board:
The board is now a torus (doughnut). The top and bottom edges are
considered next to each other, as are the left and right edges. As an
example a pawn may move left one space from a tile on the left edge of
the board, and be placed on the rightmost tile of the same row.

Spherical board:
A bit more tricky, here the board must have an even number of columns.
When a pawn moves up off the top row of the board, it returns to the
top row N/2 tiles to the right or left where N is the number of
columns in the board. The same thing happens for the bottom edge of
the board.

Make your own board layout
===============
The board may be laid out in any shape you can come up with, just as
long as you use all the tiles. Note that empty spaces may be
considered as playable or not (see Exploring the Galaxy for more
details). If you come up with any particularly devious or exciting
board, please let us know and we will add it to the next revision of
the rules.

Exploring the Galaxy
====================
Many themed games have quite a thin veneer of theme over what is
basically an abstract mechanism(s). Here is a galactic exploration
theme for those who need that extra bit of playing pleasure.

The galaxy board is made as follows:
        []
      [][]
[][][][][]
  [][]  [][]
    [][][][][]
    [][]
    []
At the center of the galaxy is a giant black hole. You may either play
this as off limits, or allow the pawn to travel over it (but not stop
in that tile). Furthermore you might want to do something special when
the pawn travels over the center hole (for example, the black hole
causes a gravity whip that adds or subtracts 1 from your move).

You may allow the pawn to travel outside the galaxy (using virtual 
tiles) as long as it ends its move on an actual tile. For a much
harder game, restrict all movement to actual tiles.




Commentary
This is the first piecepack game I've designed. When I received my
first copy I immediately sat down and started noodling around with the
pieces. I had two basic goals in mind: make a solitare game that was
enough of a mix of strategy and randomness to give a player that "just
one more game" feeling, and utilize all the pieces in the piece pack.
As the game progressed I realized that using a different shaped board
provided different themes to the game, as well as different
challenges. Rather than restrict the rules to one set form, I have
tried to allow the player to tailor the game to his or her own level
of play.


History:
Revision 0.1 first playtest revision.


Copyleft David Bruce Cousins 2001. yadda yadda yadda
All rights reserved.