Discard piles - the elephant in the room

[Flodge]

We've all been there, watching someone play two stress cards (or equivalent upgrade) and pull the two 1's from their draw pile when anything else would have caused a spin. When this is a player that has been performing well enough to be in the top echelons of the game, you know it's probably not them just rolling the dice or doing so on a hunch:

People (understandably) are tracking their discard piles in the notes function. This makes sense when you're playing a turn based game over days/weeks rather than an hour IRL... but it completely changes the game from 'real' Heat the Boardgame where your memory and it's fallibility make stress cards a very different proposition.

Rather than making this a 'hidden' feature only known to the 300+ ELO players just make the discard pile visible?

[howie varez]

Personally, I don't track my discard or upgrades of anyone via notes in real time, I just go 100% off memory. In turn based I track discard and opponents upgrades in notes, although only started doing that fairly recently. However, I have encountered even some very high ranked players that didn't know about the notes feature, so I think in turn based it should just automatically pop-up when the game starts and tell you what it does so more people know about it.

[Phoxtrot]

I 100% agree that there should be an option to make the discard pile visible (at least to oneself).
The option could even be effective only in turn-based game.

A game like automobile has an option to show information that is normally hidden at the table. Many games on BGA do.

The problem is always the same, what is reasonable to remember at the table in real life isn't reasonable anymore in a turn based game played over weeks with 10 other tables also requiring memory. Also, restricting the information in turn-based mode is rather futile as players can keep notes, read the log and do "replay from"...

But...
The dev asked and the publisher said no.
So there is no way we can have that unless the publisher or author changes its mind.

[CreativityBrain]

Publishers dictate BGA even though us players are the ones paying.

[Suoivax]

Publishers dictate BGA even though us players are the ones paying.

and the publishers have the right to pull the game off the site if its being presented in the way they dont want.

[CreativityBrain]

Publishers dictate BGA even though us players are the ones paying.

and the publishers have the right to pull the game off the site if its being presented in the way they dont want.

Sadly, a drawback of the platform being popular (On the flip side, we need popular platform for the people to actual have an incentive to use it). "House rules" is quite a popular concept in board gaming. Every boardgame publisher should embrace it rather than forcing their own rules.

I believe most of the publishers wouldn't have mind whatever options we provide with their games, if BGA didn't have any earnings from players.

[RazorOz]

Sadly, a drawback of the platform being popular (On the flip side, we need popular platform for the people to actual have an incentive to use it). "House rules" is quite a popular concept in board gaming. Every boardgame publisher should embrace it rather than forcing their own rules.

I believe most of the publishers wouldn't have mind whatever options we provide with their games, if BGA didn't have any earnings from players.

There are house rules on BGA, you just have to convince the publisher they are necessary or a good idea. Heat already has one, "Snake Draft" is a house rule that doesn't exist in the rulebook, driven by player feedback and data that standard drafting rules significantly favour starting last on the grid. Wingspan has a whole bunch for example too, with various birds that have been deemed OP having an option to remove them from the deck.

[CreativityBrain]

Sadly, a drawback of the platform being popular (On the flip side, we need popular platform for the people to actual have an incentive to use it). "House rules" is quite a popular concept in board gaming. Every boardgame publisher should embrace it rather than forcing their own rules.

I believe most of the publishers wouldn't have mind whatever options we provide with their games, if BGA didn't have any earnings from players.

There are house rules on BGA, you just have to convince the publisher they are necessary or a good idea. Heat already has one, "Snake Draft" is a house rule that doesn't exist in the rulebook, driven by player feedback and data that standard drafting rules significantly favour starting last on the grid. Wingspan has a whole bunch for example too, with various birds that have been deemed OP having an option to remove them from the deck.

Oh, that's great to hear. Didn't know that those are house rules.

[GeekMate]

i suppose this will never be a house rules as some upgrades allow players to watch what it's inside the discard.
It's true some people track the discard, that's for sure, as IRL some people count the cards. To be honest, that's not that difficult to do with only 24 cards in your deck and only 7 types of cards (upgrade, heat, stress, 4, 3, 2, 1)