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The
Basic System - The Rank Track
One of the basic ideas for the game was that it should focus on intrigue.
The mechanics of economics and warfare should be kept simple and take
a second seat to the more personal antics of the Daemons. As I had
quite a clear idea of what kind of actions that would be available
the concept of allowing each Daemon to take one "Action" per turn
came quite naturally. But how to determine the order of these actions
was quite another matter. I had ideas of using some kind of initiative,
like in some wargames, but it got too long-winded. Besides, it turned
the Action Phase into to much of a lottery.
The idea of using permanent ranks came up after browsing through several
websites on demonology. There I discovered that during the Middle
Ages most Daemons somehow had acquired feudal ranks. For instance
Baal had morphed into a Grand Duke, no mean feat for a one-time Canaanite
fertility god. The lists of Infernal Earls and Princes made one feel
one was reading some list of Holy Roman notables assembled for one
thing or another and "so," I thought. "This is a Court." And in a
court there are always endless protocols and rituals to be observed
and everybody's place in the food chain is firmly set. The highest-ranking
nobles will always get the first picks of things while the lowly baronets
have to wait in line. Breaking the proper order is not that easy and
can hardly ever be done "upwards."
Enter the RankTrack and a numeric rank for each Daemon. The arrangement
worked very well from the first test and has not been changed a bit
since. It works like this: every Daemon has a rank number, the lower
the better (Lucifer himself is number 1 but stays out of the game).
During the Actions Phase of each game turn the Daemons each takes
one action in order of rank with the highest-ranking ones going first.
Hence the most powerful Daemons must, for better or worse, take their
Actions first each turn. This enables the less powerful ones to see
what the high and mighty are up to before deciding to either get out
of the way or interfere.
There are also some cards that allow the Daemon to pass when his number
comes up, making it possible to postpone an action by temporally sliding
down one or more "slots" on the track - a most useful trick when there
are scores of enemy waiting to jump you the moment you have made your
move.
While creating this system I did glance a lot sideways at how elegantly
Avalon Hill's Civilisation has managed to balance forces of unequal
size and I the end I think it turned out very well. It has proven
quite a tricky to play both high and low ranking Daemons and knowing
how to use each Triumvirate's (Each player controls three Daemons
chosen at random before play starts.) unique mix of Daemons is perhaps
the greatest challenge of The HellGame.
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