Blitz Stop Mechanic: Set Collection
March 11, 2018
Blitz Stop Mechanic is a new segment featured on The Dice Tower's bi-weekly Throat Punch Lunch videos about games where I pick a mechanism and then talk about games that use that mechanism in a cool, thematic way.
Games discussed:
Transcript
Hi! This is Ambie from Board Game Blitz, and this is Blitz Stop Mechanic, a segment where I pick a mechanism and then talk about games that use that mechanism in a cool, thematic way. This time, I’m talking about Set Collection.
Set Collection is where you gather different items, usually cards, and try to collect a specific set in order to get points. For example, in Gin Rummy, you’re trying to collect sets of 3 or 4 cards of either the same suit or same number. Set Collection has been used in a lot of games, but there are a few games that stood out to me as using it thematically.
One is Millennium Blades, a card game about playing a collectible card game. One of the things you can do in Millennium Blades is build a collection, which simulates the collectible part of collectible card games. During the game, you’ll be getting a bunch of cards through buying and trading them, and if you have cards of the same color and different value, you’ll get increasing points depending on how many cards you have in the collection. There are a bunch of other things going on in the game too, like building a deck in order to play in the tournament, but your collection must be separate from your tournament deck, so you have to keep all your cards organized well.
Another interesting game with set collection is Potion Explosion. In this game, you’re students in a potions class taking your exams by collecting different marbles to put in your potions. The marbles represent the ingredients to your potions, and you have different potion recipes that you can create by placing the marbles in those potions. What’s interesting is the explosion mechanism - instead of getting a set number of ingredients per turn, if you grab a marble and it causes two marbles of the same color to hit, then you get those two, and you can get a chain reaction of ingredients! The collecting is really fun when you can get a bunch of ingredients at a time.
Another game where set collection is used to simulate putting ingredients together is Scoville. Here you’re pepper farmers creating and harvesting different types of peppers for the town of Scoville. The set collection part comes in when you need to fulfill the orders of the town by getting specific sets of peppers. There are multiple types of sets that your peppers can fulfill - you can sell them at the Farmer’s Market, which is usually a smaller set that’s worth fewer points, or enter the Chili Cookoff with a recipe with a bunch of peppers that’s worth a bunch of points. What’s interesting about Scoville is that only one person can fulfill each order, so there’s also a race to get each set before another player can get it.
Set collection can be a lot more than just collecting sets of cards to play. From card collection to potion making to chili cookoffs, there are many different ways that set collection can be used in board gaming to make a game exciting and fun! Thanks for watching Blitz Stop Mechanic. Let me know your favorite games that use set collection in an interesting way!
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