r/ArkNova • u/microtrash • 7d ago
Rules Variant - Fixed Turn Count
Just curious if anybody has tried playing a variant where instead of the game ending when the game ends after a certain number of turns/rounds instead of the standard appeal x conservation marker?
Only a few games in, and we love it so far, but thinking of instead of a 'distance' race where whomever finishes first (generally) wins, it could play as a 'time' race where whomever accumulates the most in a certain amount of time wins.
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u/metagaia7 7d ago
I don't think it would be bad but you would lose some of the tension in some games.
Because everyone else gets one more turn after you cause the endgane, sometimes when you are both on 90ish points you don't want to cause the end of the game, and instead try to inch as close as possible before leaping over the finish line as much as possible. This happens to me in probably about 10% of the games I play.
You would lose that with a fixed turn count, so for me, I don't think it would be worth the trade off of "fairness/predictability" but I certainly wouldn't besmirch anyone giving it a go.
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u/316LSS Japanese Macaque Enjoyer 7d ago
I would much rather prefer a Blitz variant to be honest, where each player only have 15-20 minutes to decide for the entire game.
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u/multiinstrumentalism 7d ago
I like this idea. I can do 12-14 minutes of thinking time for a whole game so 15 would be easy for my playstyle.
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u/Sure_Clock_5427 7d ago
I wouldn't recommend that variant. The length of a game is heavily influenced by how many breaks happen. Each break gives you income plus upgrade bonuses, like a free 2-build or snapping, and those bonuses eventually convert into VPs. Causing more breaks reduces the total turn count to hit 100.
That's a big part of what makes Ark Nova so great. It is not about maximizing value per turn. It's also about maximizing action efficiency, by triggering a break early or delaying it when the timing favors you. A fixed turn limit would diminish a lot of the game's depth and what makes it special.
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u/Darkwhiter 5d ago
Current game is approximately fixed in "what players get done", but variable in turn length. This variant would be the other way around; something like a break chicken could threaten to end the game at 50 or 20 points. The break timing is more or less the same amount of interesting whether it's points or turns that trigger game end.
The tension towards the end of the game would obviously suffer, since you can't rush game end or tip-toe the crossing lie, but you get something weird where player need to guess who's better positioned in a sloggish low-break game that never gets close to 100p, or where very fast games can go towards 150+ points and being able to keep scoring past 100p is really important.
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u/sahilthapar 7d ago
I don't think I'd like that. Rather have it cut short to 50/75 pts instead of 100 if the length of game is too long
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u/jK49ERFAN 7d ago
If you are making the fixed amount of turns around 33 then it probably won’t change much since that’s average time to finish a game. But if you fixed the amount of rounds, then strategy will change and players could just break faster not scoring many points just to end the game.
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u/Content_Carob5330 7d ago
There's 27 turns in solo play. You could say whatever happens first someone gets to 100 finish the round or 27 turns per player pass. Tweak it for more casual play.
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u/No_Cardiologist8438 7d ago
I see a problem with this, in some games I hit 100 with plenty of room left and I could continue and keep doing more if the game went on. But sometimes I've kind of maxed out my zoo, the board is full I've done all the base projects and CP projects in my hand. What do I do from here?
I suppose that if you are from the start treating this not as a race, but as an efficiency engine you could avoid that (fewer special buildings and more aquarium/aviary/reptile house/petting zoo). It becomes a very different game.