[Playte] Finding the way to improve BGA Orapa Mine

[ConkerTSquirrel]

What is the reason to not just use the official rules for the offline game (i.e. in a 2p game each player would both set up a puzzle for the opponent and try to solve the opponent's puzzle)? Is that still an option that might be considered? It seems like it would improve the game a lot.

This really feels the only logical conclusion to make a competitive game.

Otherwise, it should just be considered as a co-op game to see how many turns you can solve it in.

I think I will only ever play the BGA adaptation solo from now on.

[jonny chumpo]

@ Playte, thank you for being involved and open to improvement and changes. I love this game. I'm trying to get as many friends into it as possible and spread the word!

I assume that it would be possible to have both option, the original mode and the current mode to play. Both seem valid to me, the original is obviously trickier and has a couple of ways to outwit your opponent.

Thanks again.

[JrdDaBird]

I think that allowing all players to submit an answer is a great option, though it will result in many ties. Many of the games I have played result in players making a guess when it gets down to 1/4 or 1/2 valid options. I think that limiting each player to 1 guess and you're out could also help improve the game on BGA.

Alternatively, to solve the problem you could allow all players to take their turns simultaneously, but don't reveal the information that the other players input or receive. Here you would have 2 options.
1. Keep the information that other players received hidden the whole game. You only benefit from your clues, so everyone gets the same number of turns, but has different information resulting in less ties.
2. Have a solo knowledge phase where players can get 1 piece of information, then guess if they want. If they don't guess or if they make an incorrect guess, then they get the information from the other players' clues.

[Stadonis]

has to be changed. why not build my own world, and play then? or without draw, the first person to solve wins. if it s his/her turn or not. one guess, if wrong, then lost.

[Wilcobanjo]

I'm not sure how you would implement it, but it would be nice to be able to move multiple pieces at once within the grid. When I accidentally drop one of the larger shapes in the wrong place, which happens to me at least once a game, having to delete each piece and start over is a pain.

[eager-sobhanm2525]

Hi
I have played the game a lot and I find two major problem:

1.the thing about players guessing the final answer based on luck than happens to me almost every single game (in 2 player games) when me or my opponent guess the answer in a 1/2 or 1/3 satiation, as many other comments said. I think the best thing that can be done is to whether every player chooses what they want to do in their turn and then all the clues be shown simultaneously to everyone or whoever gets the correct answer wins. Or after one player guessed the correct answer the ather one gets a turn which he or she only can guess in.

2. When you are in the middle of the game and you feel you placed the gems incorrect and then you delete everything, or after a few rounds when you haven't placed anything on the board, you can't really tell where every beam has entered the board and where it has exited, if there are 6 white beams you don't know which 2 are connected. If you can somehow determine the entering and the exiting point of every beam it would be great.
Thank you

[M006M]

Hi,
I have also played this game a lot on BGA (about 450 times) and also a few times the original board game.

Problems

I see multiple problems, all deriving from the current BGA realization of the game:

(0) The current BGA realization completely ignores the "set up a puzzle"-skill. Just like in battleship, I think this is a part of the original game that is worth playing and does not only exist to prepare the game.

(1) Most games lead to a situation where the "losing player" could also solve the game if they were allowed to. (Or has the same guessing chance 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, ...). And I mean solve the game within a few seconds, not with additional 3 minutes thinking time. (With enough thinking time of course ALL games lead to that situation when played with a shared board.)

(2) Early and mid game are completely meaningless:
(2.1) A player could skip all their turns (asks for positions where the other player already determined the state) and still win the game.
(2.2) A player could be "afk" until one final turn. Their build up 3 (fast option) / 4 (normal option) / 6 minutes (slow option) thinking time is way enough to completely process all hints in one turn.
(2.3) Playing a good move is not rewarded in most cases.
(2.4) Playing a bad move (e.g., a redundant question or a question that answers one single fact in the board and not multiple at once) is not punished in most cases.

(3) A player thoughtfully planing each of their turns (in early and mid game) has a disadvantage against a player spending no time in their first moves, as the later one has more time their clock in the end game, whilst the former completely drove the game.
In the current BGA realization, this is more a theoretical problem, as because of (2) no one takes more than 0:48 / 1:16 / 2:02 minutes for their turns in early and mid game.

Solutions

Regarding (0):
I think BOTH variants of Orapa are interesting to play. The variant with a shared problem and the variant with opponents setting up problems for each other. I don't know if the two variants should be the same game in BGA and contribute to the same ELO or if they should be two separate games, as the "set up a puzzle"-skill is only involved in one of them.
For more than 2 players, the puzzles could be set up for the right neighbor. Or everyone has to solve every puzzle, which could be more fair.

As also suggested here:

I assume that it would be possible to have both option, the original mode and the current mode to play. Both seem valid to me, the original is obviously trickier and has a couple of ways to outwit your opponent.

---

Regarding (1) and (2):
I think in the variant with a shared puzzle, the players should have separate boards and no information should be shared. Like in turingmachine.

It might be an alternative to share the asked questions but not the received information. But currently I don't see the need for that.

As also suggested here:

Alternatively, to solve the problem you could allow all players to take their turns simultaneously, but don't reveal the information that the other players input or receive. Here you would have 2 options.
1. Keep the information that other players received hidden the whole game. You only benefit from your clues, so everyone gets the same number of turns, but has different information resulting in less ties.
2. Have a solo knowledge phase where players can get 1 piece of information, then guess if they want. If they don't guess or if they make an incorrect guess, then they get the information from the other players' clues.

I don't think that the information should be shared after everyone turn.