(This was a design I created to discuss some points while helping create the Wicked 21st educational board game. This is just a sketch, an idea, the work to make it a full game remains: balancing and narratives for the arcs.)

Hidden Agends is played by four players representing four different segments of society:

• Special Interest Groups (e. g., environment), represented by ♣
• Government, represented by ♠
• Capital, represented by ♦
• Workforce / local communities, represented by ♥

The game is played for a maximum of 10 rounds. In each round, a player plays one turn, where they can change the status quo as it moves through the board, which is a trellis (see figure).

Before each player's turn moves the status quo, there is a resource round, where each player chooses whether they want to collaborate with another player. They do this by putting a card face down on the table. At the same time, all players turn the cards around. If two players have decided to mutually collaborate, they both receive a card of their suit plus a card of the suit of the other player. If a player decides not to collaborate (signaled by putting down a card with their own suit), they receive two cards of their own suit. If a player puts a card to collaborate with another player but the other player does not reciprocate, they get no cards (or get only one card). A prisoners’ dilemma of sort.

With the cards at their disposal, the playing player can choose to move the status quo. They can either move it forward by paying the necessary resources indicated in the board or they can move it back to where it was before by paying the resources indicated in the board. A narrative for the current status quo and each of the three actions (plus fourth, back action) will be available and the player is encouraged to read it aloud. The player needs the variety of resources indicated in the trellis to change the status quo but they can trade 4 cards of the same resource (for any resource) for one resource (of any resource). This trade can only be done when it is their turn and they can do it as many times as they want.

All players see what cards the other players have and their total number.

Game ending and victory conditions

The game finishes when the status quo arrives to a level 10 goal, of which they are eight possible outcomes. If the status quo doesn’t arrive to a level 10 goal in 10 rounds (40 movements), the game is declared a failure and everybody loses.

At the beginning of the game, each player picks randomly one of four possible victory conditions for their segment. The card contains 4 specific level 10 goals that satisfy the victory condition and one in particular that constitutes an individual victory. The goals are designed that every combination of four goal cards for the four different segments of society have at least one level 10 goal that fulfill them all. That is, it is always possible for the four players to arrive to a level 10 goal that will satisfy their victory condition (but not necessarily their individual victory condition).

If the status quo arrives to a level 10 goal, the victory conditions for all players are revealed. If all four players conditions are fulfilled, the game is considered a success. If any player’s individual victory condition is also fulfilled they are considered übergewinners. If not all four player’s conditions are fulfilled, the game is considered a toss up, with poor winners and sore losers. In that case, if any player’s fulfill their individual victory conditions, it is considered a Pyrrhic victory.

From the reached level 10 goal, a second game can be played, where the players will play a different segment of the society, determined by chance. The trellis is the same, what changes is the narrative to accommodate the second time around plus the new starting condition.

Example game play

Players:

• Alex (pron. e/em) plays SIGs, represented by ♣
• Bailey (pron. hu/hum) plays Government, represented by ♠
• Cameron (prom. xe/xem) plays Capital, represented by ♦
• Drew (pron., ze/zem) plays Workforce, represented by ♥

It’s Bailey’s turn to play. In hus hands, hu has 3♠, 2♦ and 1♥. The status quo is in L2.1 (in yellow):

The narrative indicates environmental groups are picketing City Hall against the proposed Amazon warehouse. Bailey’s victory conditions involve large expenses to build a new recycling center and thus have been trading actively with Cameron to help ease Capital into working the government. That has been badly received by Alex and the political pain is being felt.

Bailey’s can try to infiltrate the environmental group and have a new leader raise that will put a stop to the picketing, albeit temporarily by using an environmental card (♣) and backtracking to L1.1 (in green). But hu doesn’t have any ♣s, but hu can trade for 4♠ (if hu chooses not to trade with anybody, hu will have 5♠s after trade round). Bailey can also trade with others and get another card plus the extra ♠ hu needs to for the 4♠ to trade for the ♣. Who to trade with is tricky, though. In a strange reversal, Alex and Cameron traded last turn, which enabled Alex to move the status quo (requirement: ♣♦) from L1.1 to L2.1 and start picketing City Hall. That has left Bailey confused about Cameron’s objectives (Cameron is playing to grow support in the city for its company and set a smart city initiative taking over the government; the warehouse is much less important than that and the accumulation of ♠s it made already will be decisive in that regard).

Besides backtracking, all other options for Bailey’s also involve getting an environmental card: hu has been put into a position where all hus options need to deal with the SIGs in one way or another. At the end, it decides to trade with Drew and attempt to get the ♣♥♥ and move to L3.3, where there is a truce in the picket for an open dialogue lead by the labor unions. Bailey discusses the possibility of trading with Drew, who agrees reluctantly as ze has seen Bailey’s getting cozy with Cameron in previous turns. At the exchange, Drew does not trade, Bailey’s loses the trade and has to pass as hu has no possible action.

Figure: example trellis

(Source as a GitHub gist)

This figure is complex due to automatic layout issues but it should be render appealing with some artist involvement. The arcs contain the resources needed to move forward and the resources needed to back the action. Only resources for the first three levels were thought out, the rest are just place holders.

The game starts expanding, then contracting until “the big squeeze” in level 5, after which two end nodes become the most likely outcomes (render in matching colors) until the end in level 10. From level 5 to 10 is fine tuning and negotiation although switching to other pairs is possible if lots of resources are involved (not pictured in the example).

In a physical set up, the nodes themselves will have a number and a QR code, the narratives will be available in the web.