Making the spirit tokens more balanced

[tbhp]

So you're saying they're not on par? Cat and eagle are two of the worst in the 2 player game for the reasons you stated.

I'd say they are in the middle, not the worst. But if they get lots of reds, this erases the issue they have, as they end up with a very advantageous return of points per tile, so I don't see why they need to be given even more points.

When you have Cat and you have 5 buildings, and maybe a card that puts animals on them, you normally shouldn't be disadvantaged against a Butterfly. I'd say it becomes a pretty balanced matchup in this case.

Stork may be more complicated because it's tricky to create 3 groups of 2 buildings and make everything work on your board, but if you manage to do it, the same principle applies.

For a 3-4p game, I notice poor butterfly getting blocked from everyone else, so I try not to pick it even when presented the choice.

Yeah, it's tricky because while usually in 1v1 you see yellows are available, decide to pick Butterfly and then try to prevent your opponent from needing too many yellows, in multiplayer you are stuck with only having 19 yellows for everyone, with no realistic way of countering every opponent individually. So if everyone needs a bunch of yellows, it quickly turns into a battle for them and your opponents will be happy to take them whenever it's convenient for them while also preventing you from getting favorable sets with yellows in them.

For this reason Beaver may actually be the strongest spirit in multiplayer, since it exploits a resource that people usually don't particularly rely on. Sure, people may decide to deny you sets with greys in them, but usually they'll have more incentive to take the colors the need. Also, since the bag has 23 greys, which is up there with water as the most abundant resource, it gives you good chances of getting many leftover greys by the end of the game.

[tbhp]

Recently I started playing a game and was surprised to find multiple options, and there was something like “random board excluding board 8 because it is imbalanced”, I thought maybe the same solution could be applied here.

Maybe people find it desirable for some games, but I don't know how popular it would be for Harmonies. I mean, would people really choose to enter a tournament where Bufferfly is banned? I'm sure most everyone would rather win a competition where all the spirits are used. It wouldn't feel very satisfying for the win to come with a caveat "no Butterfly was used because too OP". That's like playing a game but avoiding the final boss haha.

As you would have noticed, there are 2 spirit cards per landscape element, so we leave the lion spirit card (10 points for 3 or more yellow together) stronger with no competition.

That's already the case every time Lion faces a spirit that is not Butterfly. The argument I'd use is that if Butterfly was absent, people my start complaining about another spirit they find OP instead, like Lion. But it would be blasphemy to play Harmonies without its mascot spirit...

Personally I like it when my opponent gets the butterfly, I get all fired up trying to block it, all till the whole table is filled with clusters of sunshine tokens that the fire in me dies, and I come to my senses and realize I have a spirit card too. Oh, I actually need some blues … if only my tears could make that river longer… hahaha

Yeah, I don't really see the point if you're never put out of your comfort zone. It's cool when your opponent gets a stronger spirit and you win anyway. You may argue that the spirits should all be equal, but that's not the case since they all have various strengths. Removing Butterfly doesn't change the fact that some spirits are stronger than others, so the unbalance issue wouldn't be solved anyway. It's not like Butterfly is automatically involved in the games where you feel the other spirit was too strong. Generally, it's due to some other match up.

Which gets me to the point: maybe the more relevant imbalance is how the top 4 compares to the rest. I'm pretty sure more than 90% of my losses happen against Butterfly, Lion, Turtle or Beaver. That's the group I would target if I ever wanted to rewrite the game, rather than just Butterfly in particular.

[Yippiedada]

But it would be blasphemy to play Harmonies without its mascot spirit...

haha.. yes I know, crazy right? I was grinning when I wrote that, I knew I was going to get shot down for that, but I couldn't ignore the math aspect of nerfing the butterfly.

Which gets me to the point: maybe the more relevant imbalance is how the top 4 compares to the rest. I'm pretty sure more than 90% of my losses happen against Butterfly, Lion, Turtle or Beaver. That's the group I would target if I ever wanted to rewrite the game, rather than just Butterfly in particular.

So you have beef with 4 of them, oh that is going to be rough. Shall we request for a feature to nerf all the yellow, blue and grey spirits? Haha... (this time I am really joking.)

Jokes aside, no I don't think you want to rewrite the game just yet. We all have different ways of dealing with imbalances in games:- original poster proposes a different point system, you look for combos with synergies, I block, often to no avail.

I will be digressing but it is related. I have just gotten the crescendo expansion and read the rulebook. There are now even more diverse ways to score, one of it (the sanctuaries) feels like a cross between spirits and animal cards. You get bonus points for 2 colors, and it is not predetermined at the start of the game. They are drawn like animal cards, thus you will have a lot more player agency on how you want to "power up".

There are other changes in scoring landscape elements in the expansion. The tweaks are interesting:- Buildings, tall trees and pairs of fields are now worth more but are harder to validate.

I wanted to talk about this because the game is evolving into something modular. Added scoring systems: Spirits, Pulse, Sanctuaries, Whispers on board A, B, C or D. You will be able to mix and match and I think most of us will be able to find a version of the puzzle we enjoy. To relate back to original issue, maybe the imbalance of some spirit cards could be evened out if we play spirits on a certain board with a certain expansion. It's just a hunch now, we will find out later, and I do hope the crescendo gets implemented on bga. =)