Development Log: The Vortex #13 - Rogations

Here is where the religious theme of the game takes over.  Without Rogation cards, it's very much a sci-fi themed game.

But part of the reason I designed the game the way I did was to think of a way to create conflict where killing your opponent was not the main objective.  So I came up with religious conversion, instead.  Just using that language helped open up tons of mechanical possibilities, so that way cards were not necessarily "killed," and could be moved elsewhere than just a Graveyard pile.

But anyway, this post is about Rogations!

With Rogations, I think I may have to spend quite a lot of time playtesting them to find out if some of the requirements are too strict or too loose.  Pestilence basically has no requirement, so you can play it any time, while with Resurrection, you must have three Devotees or Zealots in play, so that's a hefty price.  But are they balanced well?  Is the power of the card balanced by its requirements?

Some of them, like Miracle, are very damaging, and you can see that the requirement is that you must have fewer cards in play than your opponents.  So if Player A has 2 cards in play, B has 3, and C has 4, and Player B plays Miracle, it would only affect Player C, and Player A would remain untouched.  So it is more an equalizer than anything.

Some of the cards are fairly straight forward, and you might use them at any opportunity, such as Prayer.  But some cards may be a help or a hindrance.  Is Miracle that great if you know you could have converted the Devotee that got sent to the Vortex?  You wouldn't want to use it unless you had to get rid of a powerful card in play, but then the opponent gets to select what card goes away, and it might not be the one you want.  Or, if you're the Red player, your strategy might be to use Miracle any time, since cards in the Vortex count toward your points to win.

I think what I'm going for is to make all four Devotee colors have equally powerful cards, but the randomly distributed Rogations throws a monkey wrench into the works and adds an element of chance (and surprise).

Or, at least, that is what appears to happen, whether I meant to do it or not!

I am also considering changing the rules slightly so each player gets fewer Rogations in their deck if I find they are played too often or overpower other aspects of the game.