Siege at Nem

My Shadows Upon Lassadar game trilogy has proven to be pretty popular with the solo PnP set. I've recently begun designing the 2nd trilogy and continuing the narrative begun in the fantasy world of Lassadar

All 3 games in the 2nd trilogy involve a group of Barons from the south invading Lassadar and laying siege to 3 of its cities.

Here is a look at how I've been occupying my game design time the past week

This is what is commonly called a postcard war game. Small enough to fit on a single sheet of paper but with enough strategy and tactics to provide a fun wargaming experience in under 30 minutes. Some of these games are very creative in how they lay everything out to fit, as well as using things like decks of standard cards to provide the randomizing element in the game. While most postcard wargames center on WW2, there are games out there about the Roman Empire, the American Revolution and WW1.

Siege at Nem has been a lot of fun to design and challenging to fit everything into such a small space. I made the choice early on to use a Tarot card deck rather than a standard deck (though you can use that as well) because it imbues the game with a bit more feeling of magic in the narrative. I was able to use card suit icons for the standard cards needed, rather than create 2 sets of rules and files. I also tried to use icons as much as possible to help in comprehension during play since certain units appear in the game only in later rounds.

I admire this style of compact game experience and am interested in designing and playing more of them.