Bliss Stage RPCG (Role-Playing Card Game)
- Start Date: April 2011
- Status: Ongoing
- Progress: Writing Comprehensive Rules.
Number of Cards: 110 - Goal: To be an experiment on Game Content as Game Mechanics, and for the near-hostile player interaction that the game’s tone will bring (“This world isn’t fair”). Also, to specifically further test the Resource-as-Mechanic gameplay started with MLP:DCG.
- Notes: The card game is going to great lengths to downplay some of the less culturally and socially acceptable traits of the original IP. The original IP is meant for ages 18+ (and rightly so), while this game will attempt to be 16+. This is solely as a preventative measure and not intended to be a change to the IP itself.
Win Conditions: To lose last. Losing entails one of the following.
- Reaching a predetermined amount of Bliss. Bliss is gained through costs of positive events, through certain types of your enemy’s Threats, and through some effects. Bliss can never be removed.
- Reaching six Trauma. Trauma is gained primarily as damage done by your enemy’s Threat and through the deaths of your Anchors (each death adds one permanently). Trauma, like Bliss, is a resource; though you do not “spend” Trauma (Trauma is a minimum requirement). Like Bliss, Trauma can’t be lost, but can be temporarily negated.
- Running out of cards in the deck and in the hand.
Essentially, if you can play the more powerful cards, you’re closer to losing.
Game-Specific Mechanics:
- Sexuality. Pilots and their Anchors have a seual preference. This determines how high their bond, or Intimacy, can go. Intimacy determines success or failure of most Threat-related actions, as it’s your measurement of power. Intimacy is gained through positive events and through successfully defeating Threats. A “Positive” bond caps at five (5) Intimacy, and all other bonds are considered capped at three (3) Intimacy.
- Anchor-Specific Levels: Anchors have different effects depending on how high their Intimacy is with the Pilot. There are three different effects, at level 1/3/5. Asexual Anchors, unable to hit level 5, have a slightly different effect design and have their power spread over two effects (rather than three).
- Evolving Threats. Threats have different borders on the left and right edges. While a player may only have on Active Threat in play, that player may augment the Threat with one that shares a border to give the Threat its effects, though at a minimum cost of Trauma and possible additional reward for your opponent if they defeat it. Some effects won’t even work without some Augments present. There are three borders: Blade, Bliss, and Blitz. Blade borders are on cards that tend to instill Trauma, Bliss borders instill more Bliss gained, and Blitz borders tend to focus on immediate destruction. A Threat can have one or two types of borders, or have a Null border (nothing can augment that side, so it functions as a cap).
Card Types:
- Pilots: The “Main” card that exists outside of the deck. The Pilot card is your most important asset, and t is that card’s success or failure that determines your own. The Pilot has a single, but always on, effect that can’t be turned off.
- Anchors: The cards that support your Pilot through Intimacy and Leveled effects. You start with one Anchor in play, and have a limit of three Anchors in play (that must have different names). An Anchor can be Killed either through Backlash (Threats), or through Suicide (Intimacy at zero), though there will be an event that can kill an anchor directly.
- Events are the core of your deck. There are positive events that have a higher Bliss cost, and Negative events that have a higher Trauma cost. They have a wide range of effects for both you and your enemy, from battling Threats to changing Intimacy levels, drawing cards to wiping the entire field.
- Threats are your main offense in the game, and have a drastic effect that can be augmented further. Threats also have a Value, as that’s the measurement of their power: currently you must beat the value with your combined Intimacy plus the Pilot’s Attack roll to remove the threat and score some rewards. However, failing such a roll badly enough can cause a Backlash that can outright Kill one of your Anchors. Additionally, if you do not have an Active Threat while your enemy does, the enemy can simply roll to attempt to kill an Anchor outright, so you better have one out!
Sexuality Mechanic Specifics: (Ones that cap at five discussed. If it failed to meet the criteria, it caps at three)
- Heterosexual bond is one between differently gendered Pilots and Anchors that share the trait. (Has the most overall support, jack-of-all-trades style)
- Homosexual bond is one between same gendered Pilots and Anchors that share the trait. (Has lower Intimacy drops and gains than usual)
- Bisexual bond is between essentially any Pilot and Anchor regardless of of their trait; it is limited by the trait of the other member and following the other gender rules. (Has higher intimacy drops and gains than usual, so watch out
- Asexual bond can’t reach an Intimacy of five with either gender, regardless of their trait. (Is relatively rare and “easy” to kill, so powerful effects).