VibeBox
Contributor
the last few days my room mates and i have been playing a new format we call hollywood squares. it's a hybrid of grid drafting and auction, and it scales very well as the rules are the same no matter the number of players.
start with a pool of ~35 cards per player. (that number isn't certain, we've played with several. needs more testing to get nailed down)
each player starts with 100 points.
roll/rps/whatevs to see who is first and proceed clockwise
lay out a 3x3 grid just as though you were going to grid draft.
on your turn you nominate any of the 9 currently face up cards. that card is now the card up for auction and you have the right place a starting bid. (if a player has any points the starting bid must be at least 1)
bidding continues until no player wishes to make another bid, at which the high bid is the winner. the player with the high bid takes the card and replaces it with a new card from the pool.
the turn is then passed to the next player who nominates a card.
in the event that a player runs out of points, they still retain their turn to nominate but the starting bid is considered to be zero, and any bid will win over the active player.
when the pool is empty, build and shuffle
i already like it better than auction because auction can be too difficult for less skilled players since there is only one card available at a time. this leads them to get jumpy and bored, wasting time and points on cards they'll never play. HWS lets them look at 8 other cards and think ahead about what they want while two other players are bidding over a card unrelated to their deck.
i think it retains most of the depth of auction while mimicking the "gui" of gridding.
hope some of you will try it out and post feedback. i know i'll be playing this from time to time when i'm in the dreaded 2-4 player zone.
start with a pool of ~35 cards per player. (that number isn't certain, we've played with several. needs more testing to get nailed down)
each player starts with 100 points.
roll/rps/whatevs to see who is first and proceed clockwise
lay out a 3x3 grid just as though you were going to grid draft.
on your turn you nominate any of the 9 currently face up cards. that card is now the card up for auction and you have the right place a starting bid. (if a player has any points the starting bid must be at least 1)
bidding continues until no player wishes to make another bid, at which the high bid is the winner. the player with the high bid takes the card and replaces it with a new card from the pool.
the turn is then passed to the next player who nominates a card.
in the event that a player runs out of points, they still retain their turn to nominate but the starting bid is considered to be zero, and any bid will win over the active player.
when the pool is empty, build and shuffle
i already like it better than auction because auction can be too difficult for less skilled players since there is only one card available at a time. this leads them to get jumpy and bored, wasting time and points on cards they'll never play. HWS lets them look at 8 other cards and think ahead about what they want while two other players are bidding over a card unrelated to their deck.
i think it retains most of the depth of auction while mimicking the "gui" of gridding.
hope some of you will try it out and post feedback. i know i'll be playing this from time to time when i'm in the dreaded 2-4 player zone.
