New Board Game Terms To Add To Your Vocabulary
I learn new board game terms all the time, usually from other game designers. Here are some of the terms I've heard recently.
Asynchronous maintenance or asynchronous refresh
According to Mark Schynert, you see this in games like Manhattan Project and Dwellings of Eldervale, where people perform maintenance activities without waiting for a game turn to end.
Calvinball / Calvinballing
Inspired by 'Calvinball', the game played in the classic comic strip 'Calvin & Hobbes' where you make up the rules as you go. To 'Calvinball' is to change the rules / incentives of the game after you start playing. This is sometimes necessary but generally undesirable since it creates confusion over the 'correct' way to play.
Co-petitive
A term for a game that fuses cooperative and competitive play. It offers a newer and more expansive way to play and design, since the game blends these two distinct ways to play.
Decision points
The number of things you have to look at to make one meaningful, strategic decision. Decision points may include things like your hand, your player area / tableau, another player's tableau, the state of the board
Deeply thematic abstract games
A games where the theme adds color and flavor, but does not connect with the mechanics in the game. Azul and Splendor are two examples.
Expandalone
A type of game that can be played as an expansion to a base game, or as it's own, standalone game. Examples include Star Realms: Frontiers (which can be played with the cards from the original Star Realms game or on its own) and The Funkoverse.
Mechanical competency
A player's ability to play correctly and independently - they are not cheating (accidentally or intentionally). One must have mechanical competency to graduate to strategic competency (see below). I talk about mechanical competency more in this post.
Plinking
According to Paul David Allen, plinking refers to doing some damage to a unit, but not enough to really bother them. It's a video game term that's been brought into tabletop gaming.
Post-euro
According to Richard Buxton, Post-euro is a genre of game in which euro-style mechanics are used to deliver non-euro outcomes.
Pre Testing
Taking a concept for how you think mechanics will work in your game to a social media design group for testing your idea before testing it through a prototype.
According to Matthew T Bivens, "I’ve gained some insightful perspectives on my initial mechanics from this pre testing session in BGDL."
Reverse Bleed
According to Sarah Shipp, it's when a player's emotions pull them deeper into the thematic experience.
Ripple effect
Changing one thing and seeing what changes as a result. Imagine changing a thing to be worth 3 gold instead of 2 gold, or costs 3 Energy instead of 2.
Strategic competency
A player's ability to play not just correctly, but with strategic intent. One must first have mechanical competency (see above) in order to have strategic competency. I talk about strategic competency more in this post.
Strategic horizon
The number of turns a player can see ahead or plan ahead.
In a perfect information game like chess, a player's strategic horizon is only limited by their skill at thinking ahead, since there is no luck or hidden information in the game.
In most other games, your strategic horizon is limited by the luck or hidden information.
Table presence first design
According to Fabricio Leotti, it's another way to go about a game besides the well known theme first and mechanics first design. It is basically an approach where you first consider the presence of your game components in the table.
Zoom Able
According to Matthew T Bivens, Zoom Able (or Zoomable) refers to a game that can be played over video conferencing.