Maracaibo is now in alpha!

[joris debrande]

Still not in Beta ? Just checking out if i can place my Explorer assistant on space 9 yet.
Need more testers you say? Anytime!

[Kayvon]

Need more testers you say?

Not exactly...

Thanks for your interest. For the non-reviewers wishing to join the alpha, I have good news and bad news.

The bad news is that the overwhelming response the alpha has received means we aren't looking for additional testers at this time.

The good news is that the overwhelming response the alpha has received means we've already received the requisite number of approvals, and we'll be requesting a move to beta once the publisher has had the opportunity to review everything.

No additional testers are being added at this time, but be on the lookout for an upcoming beta. It's a great game!

[DurinUK]

Shame, would have loved to test it too

[BryleCuff]

I would very much like to join the alpha. Much appreciated!

[Kayvon]

I would very much like to join the alpha. Much appreciated!

Those who already qualify as testers are welcome to play. No additional testers are being manually added at this time, but be on the lookout for an upcoming beta. It's a great game!

[razriv4tel]

Any chance i couls join alpha test? I am big fan of Phister's games

[Zniwiarz86]

Nope, any other testers then those who qualifies till now won't be added.

[garzahd]

Some feedback from my first play last night. I have one bug that I'll file in the bugs area, the rest of these are halfway between suggestion and opinion. I'm playing on a desktop at 1920x1080, I won't have the patience to try to replicate any display issues on mobile.
- Overall quite a good implementation
- The four public tableau cards (which anyone can pick up for a buck) are just a little too tiny on the right sidebar to be helpful. I kept having to switch to the "board" tab to find them in larger size, which felt like it needlessly slowed me down.
- Generally speaking (this is a property of the base game of Maracaibo and not this implementation), going first has substantial strength because you get first crack at four potentially lucrative tableau cards, whereas the rest of the table is guaranteed to see a few rejected ones. We have a house rule that player order is determined by a VP auction. I understand this can't be prioritized in front of issues that are literally about the game rules, but it will continue to make me sad every time I fail to be lucky enough to go first.
- Animation of a moving boat is drawn overtop of the "Your hand" dropdown, which is a little distracting when other people are taking turns, but hardly a dealbreaker.
- During combat, the revealed combat tile could afford to be a little larger. (I appreciate that the faction-selection buttons bake in the 3rd +3 if applicable)
- Undo of moves is very much appreciated, but a little inconsistent. It would be nice if there were an option to always offer an undo before ending your turn. Specifically, I made a misclick during an end-of-cycle card play and was unable to fix it despite having no new information.
- The game log referring to ship upgrades by ID number is helpful to a developer but unhelpful to a player, this should probably be modified a bit
- I missed having a visual representation of what our physical game players call the "dudes in jail" (meaning: figures that are able to be unlocked via the Santiago action). It makes the full 8-meeple limit more obvious. I had a gut instinct that the game might have violated that limit at some point but can't provide actual proof without being able to see whether I have dudes in jail. Also, if the dudes-in-jail count is currently 0, then Santiago won't give you a dude (this didn't come up in my game)
- During final scoring, the sliding animation of the rows of the table is unnecessary to add suspense. It was already the same information dumped in the game log 20 seconds earlier, and the BGA audio for "you won" or "you lost" has already started playing.

[Kayvon]

Some feedback from my first play last night.

We don't usually check the thread for feedback, but since I happened to stumble across the thread...

- The four public tableau cards (which anyone can pick up for a buck) are just a little too tiny on the right sidebar to be helpful.

You're referring to the display cards. Those are available in full size on the Board tab or, if you like having them all available at once, on the View All tab.

We have a house rule that player order is determined by a VP auction.

That's an interesting perspective I hadn't considered. I own the game, but haven't worried too much about first player advantage, primarily because the first player is more likely to finish first and thus go last in the next round. Of course, I may be underthinking it, so I'm open to the possibility that there is a bigger advantage than I'm seeing. Regardless, it's not a matter of not "prioritizing" house rules, but of implementing the game that the publisher provided. We don't have authority to simply change the rules in the implementation.

Animation of a moving boat is drawn overtop of the "Your hand" dropdown

Reported and responded to here: https://boardgamearena.com/bug?id=109139

Undo of moves is very much appreciated, but a little inconsistent. It would be nice if there were an option to always offer an undo before ending your turn. Specifically, I made a misclick during an end-of-cycle card play and was unable to fix it despite having no new information.

Also suggested in two separate suggestions already. You can always undo during your turn. The end-of-round play is different because once you've played the card, another player is taking his turn already. It's a single action, not a whole turn. We can't allow you to undo without interfering with another turn that's now already in progress.

Quick rant: I have a disdain for undo in implementation. It's a completely thankless job. Players whine endlessly if it's not there. If it is there, players still complain, no matter how well it's implemented. I've built up my own custom undo algorithm that avoids the janky one BGA provides, which requires all players to refresh every time undo is used and used to (maybe still does?) grant the player more time and cause other problems. No matter how smoothly it's implemented, players continually complain that it's not granular enough or too granular. Why can't they undo just the most recent move? Why can't they undo more than the most recent move? Why weren't they warned that drawing a card or rolling dice (not in Maracaibo, per se) would prevent undoing? Sometimes I'll pour more hours into bolstering undo further in games, but it's rarely merited any positive feedback. Consequently, I'm always hesitant to use undo at all.

Okay, that wasn't a quick rant and I didn't mean to knock on your honest suggestion. Hopefully it's insightful all the same.

The game log referring to ship upgrades by ID number is helpful to a developer but unhelpful to a player, this should probably be modified a bit

How would you modify it? Originally, the log just said "an upgrade" but we felt it would be more useful for players to indicate what was upgraded. The manual doesn't give these upgrades names and I felt "<player> upgrades that one upgrade that lets you hold more cards" wouldn't really work.

I agree that this feels like a situation where it's unfulfilling, but also a situation where it's easier to think something's bad and harder to think of how to make it better. Again, I'm open to suggestions that are easy for players to understand and work across all languages. I'm also open to reverting to just "an upgrade" rather than providing the number.

It makes the full 8-meeple limit more obvious. I had a gut instinct that the game might have violated that limit

The limit is show in the player panel. The game tracks this, shows it to the players, and doesn't violate it.

During final scoring, the sliding animation of the rows of the table is unnecessary to add suspense.

I agree with you completely. The animation was specifically requested by the publisher, so we added it.


Earnest request: Let me know if this sort of response is helpful or insightful, or if you'd rather forego it in the future. I realize people don't often get to peek behind the curtain and see why certain decisions are made, but I also understand that not everyone wants to, either.

[garzahd]

Honestly that's more of a response than I was expecting. Thanks for writing it.

I am a web developer of some software that has nothing to do with games, so I totally understand your comment about certain parts being a thankless job. And your point about ship upgrade names is also fair, I don't have a magic answer, and trying to use language like "the one that gives you the new village action" is both corny and vague.

I played a second game yesterday and the final-scoring timing had been significantly improved. The "20 seconds earlier" logging now proceeds at light speed, and the BGA audio is correctly stifled until the sliding animation is over. So it's back to being adequately suspenseful again.