by Khenubaal84
Hi Guys,
this is my first post in the Boardgeek-Forum, and actually the final reason to register here. I was enjoying reading your threads and comments on Spartacus Variants and Strategies and was completely fascinated by the player made Market and Influence cards. Beeing a boardgamegeek AND a big fan of the Series I am enjoying "Spartacus" since ca. two years as I have never enjoyed a boardgame before (maybe with the exception of Pandemic: Legacy).
After having played several dozen of matches and beeing a hobby-gamedesigner me and the other core players of the group started to develop some Variants. We have tested them durng the last matches and we think, that they made the game even more fun and deeper, but - I have to admit - also longer and a bit more complicated, as you have to track some more details.
However, we really like our house-rule-bouquet, so I thought, it would be a good idea to share them here with you and get some feedback on it from the community. Also I would be interested, if anyone has further ideas or has tested then themselves and can give some impressions out of their matches.
1) Some prelude and the basic ideaAcutally I would like to stress out two points, before starting with the specific description of the house rules, in order to avoid any misunderstandings.
First of all, I am aware, that our house-rules are changing to some extend and in some specific cases the balance of the game, making several strategies, cards or abilities stronger, or weaker. However, I think, this is ok, as long, as the game as it is is still
balanced (even if it is then a new equilibrium-point and not the same, as with the original rules). I believe and this is what we experienced, this is - overall - the case with our rules, but please let me know, if you think otherwise.
Furthermore I would like to say, that for my group, the main issue of the game is developing of the ludus (slaves, gladiators, equipment), organizing the fights and finally winning them. The Intrigue phase/cards are a lot of fun and give the game the dynamic, as they add some workarounds and random, and also an additional layer of tactics and negotiation, but for us, the main dish is clearly the arena phase and to some extend the market. So our house-rules are focusing on these phases. I know, that a lot of players are focusing on the Intrigue phase, so for them maybe our rules won't fit. However, I hope, there are also players out there, who will have fun with our ideas.
2) MAIN CHANGES:
2.1) Double market in the first roundThis is a house-rule I have already read somewhere here. We - actually - have the same. As we felt, that the Ludi are too empty at the beginning of the game, and morever, one strong card can have massive impact during the first 2-3 rounds we decided to have the double number of market cards in the first round of market. In order to keep the auction going, all players are also granted the dounble number of their starting money. (So on most cases 20 gold instead of 10).
2.2) Reduced Intrigue DeckFor us - the Reaction cards are more fun, than Scheme. Furthermore, we believe, that the easy "gain +1 Influence" cards for exhausting/discrading gladiators/slaves/guards, or for free are making the game too luck-based, too random and in our opinion also too short - so overall are reducing strategy and tactics by far too much. So we have excluded these cards from the deck, thereby also increasing the share of the fun Reaction cards. We furthermore added two player-made reaction cards:
a) Deserves the Rudis: If a victorious gladiator becomes or already is Champion, his Dominus must grant him freedom/discard him (thereby loosing 1 Influence by loosing the Champion), or loose 3 Imfluence due to the anger of the crowd.
b) Shall I begin?:A Gladiator may skip his attack for one round of the fight and instead regenerate lost dices equal to his gold value.
2.3) Fatigued GladiatorsIn our opinion too ofter players stick to only one strong Gladiator and do not by any mid-strenght Gladiators, or only one back-up. Starting Gladiators are in most cases sold down quickly. This is currently not really reflecting the fluff of the game, as a Ludus normally had more than only one, or tweo Gladiators in it's ranks, with Champions beeing backed up with solid fighters and developing newcomers. So we thought, how to get players to maintaining a bigger Gladiator team.
Therefore we introduced Gladiator Fatigue: Each time a gladiator fights in the arena, he is fatigued for the next game round, regardless of winning or loosing the fight. In order to be unfatigued again, he has to refrain from fighting in the arena for one game round.
A fatigued Gladiator can still be invited and actually can still fight in the arena - however, if he does so, he starts with a penalty of -2 dices. His Dominus decides just before the match, which two dices he wants to substract from his overall dice pool.
Gladiator Fatigue is cumulative. So if a gladiator fights two rounds in the row in the arena, his penalty for a third fight in the row would be -4 dices, and so forth. However, one round without fighting is enough to get unfatigued again, regardless of how high the penalty got before.
2.4) Developing GladiatorsWe also thought, that it's a pity, that Starting Gladiators or the weaker ones from the deck never have a chance to stand up against the stronger Fighters. Also we wanted to reward long-term planning. So we decied to add a mechanism for development of Gladiators, as follows:
Each time a Gladiator wins a fight, one of his stats (ATT, DEF or INI) is permanently boosted by +1 dice. However - there are several limitations to this mechanism:
a) No stat can ever be boosted more than by +1 dice, so no gladiator can gain more than 3 dices - +1 ATT, +1 DEF and +1 INI).
b) Which dice is boosted, is decided by randomly, rolling a dice: roll-result 1-2: +1 to ATT, roll-result 3-4: +1 to DEF, roll-result 5-6: +1 to INI. If the Gladiator has already boosted one stat, that you roll to determine between the two other stats: roll-result 1-3: first unboosted stat, roll-result 4-6: second unboosted stat. If the gladiator already has boosted two stats, than you dont need to roll and the single unboosted stat is boosted automatically.
c) There is an overall cap of maximum 12 dices for all Gladiators (WITH ONE EXCEPTION!!! - see below). This was made for balancing, as strong gladiators with 3 boost could get just completely unbeatable due to game mechanic. That means, that gladiators have the following development possibilities:
7 dice (d) Starting Gladiators -> Fully developed: +3, 10 dice (d)
8 d Gladiators -> Fully developed: +3, 11 d
9 d Gladiators -> Fully developed: +3, 12 d
10 d Gladiators -> Fully developed: +2, 12 d
11 d Gladiators -> Fully developed: +1, 12 d
AND NOW THERE COMES THE EXCEPTION: As we felt, we are weakening the 12 d Gladiators, so the stars of the game by these our rule, and as we wanted to still give them a slight advantage above all other fighters and allow also some devlopment for these champions, we decided to allow Gladiators, who already start with 12 dices (so Spartacus, Gannicus, Theokoles, the Egyptian, and from the promo cards Magnetius, Hadrianus and Dolor) to develop one dice to a total of 13 dices, reaching a level unaccessibale for the rest. So:
12 d Gladiators -> Fully developed: +1, 13 d
d) The last main/major change we made was about the fighting. Here I have to say, that we are not using the Festival cards, as I am lacking the Shadow of Death Expansion - we are playing with the base game, Serpent and Wolf, the Promo Cards and some Fandom-cards from this forum. However, we wanted to get more variaty into the fighting, so we have designed a special ARENA-Deck.
Each time - just before the bidding for the Host, one card is drawn from the ARENA-Deck. These card determines, what kind of fight the HOST has to organize. When the deck is completely drawn, cards are shuffled and the deck can be used again. Currently we have the following 10 cards in the ARENA-Deck:
2 x Normal Arena Fight: Just the normal fights, like in the base game.
2 x Normal Primus: The host has to organize a Primus, however, he will get only 1 Influence, not 2. And: we got rid of the Primus Reaction cards in the Intrigue deck, as Primus is covered by the ARENA-Deck now.
2 x Festival of Bellona (Card is only added to the deck, if at least for 4 players are playing the match: The host has to organize to normal fights. He thereby can only invite a Dominus a second time, if all Domini were already invited at least onces (like with the Primus). Each winner of a fight gets Influence/Favour as normal. However: The host gets only 1 Influence for organizing these 2 fights.
Important: No Gladiator is allowed to fight in both fights in the Festival. If a Dominus get's a second invitation (because someone else has declined), then he has to send in another fighter.
1 x Festival of Mars (Is added to the deck, when at least one Gladiator with a total of 11 or more dices (11+ Gladiator) is in the game): The host has to invite a Dominus, who posseses an 11+ Gladiator. If the Dominus accepts the invitation, he has to send an 11+ Gladiator in the arena. Then the host invites TWO Domini, who have to send in a Fighter (so Gladiator or Slave) with maximum 9 dices into the arena (9- Gladiators).
The 11+Gl. will then fight BOTH 9-Gl. AT ONCE - so this is a 1 vs 2 fight. Winner gets +1 Influence and +1 Favour
1 x Festival of Hera (Is added to the deck at the beginning of the 3rd market phase (so unavailable in the first two arena phases)): Actually, this is just a mixed Primus, where both sides must be represented by a team of one Gladiator and one Slave. Host gains only +1 Influence, like with the normal Primus (by the way, Slaves can also Develop stats like Gladiators and get also Fatigued like them).
1 x Festival of Charon (Is added to the game, when a 12+ Gladiator becomes available): This festival is actually portraiting Spartacus' and Oenemaus' marathon fights in the pit.
The host must invite a Dominus with a 12+ Gladiator to the arena and the Dominus must send such a gladiator into the arena, if he accepts. Then the host invites THREE 10- Gladiators (or slaves) into the arena, and their Domini must send such fighters in, if they accept.
Now, the 12+ Gladiator will fight the weaker three fighter ONE AFTER THE OTHER. The Domini of the weaker Gladiators can decide, in which order they will enter the arena. The stronger Gladiator will not regenarte any dices, if he wins a fight - the next weaker fighter will just enter the arena in the moment, when his predecessor is defeated and the fight will carry on.
If the 3 weaker fighters win, each one, who has entered the arena and survived will get a favour token. Furthermore, all Domini, who have sent in at least 1 (or 2 or even 3) 10- Fighter into the arena, will get +1 Influence (regardless of the number of fighters sent into the fight).
If the 12+ gladiator wins, he earnes one favor token for each victory, and so becomes champion. However, his Dominus earnes only +1 Influence.
Festival of Jupiter (Is added to the deck at the beginning of the 3rd market phase (so unavailable in the first two arena phases); Card is only added to the deck, if at least for 4 players are playing the match: A Tournament is played. The host must invite 4 Gladiators into the arena and devide them into two Semifinal match-ups.
The winners of the semifinal earn +1 favour. However, the Domini do not earn Influence for the Semifinal victory.
The winners of the semifinal then meet in the final of the tournament, HOWEVER, THEY ONLY DO REGENERATE 2 DICES AFTER THE SEMIFINAL FIGHT. Let me illustrate this by an example:
In Semifinal 1 Spartacus meets with Crixus and manages to win the fight with 3 Attack, 1 Defense and 2 Initiative left (3-1-2). He now enters the final with this dice pool and his player has now to decide, which to dices to regenerate. Shall he regenerate 2 Initiative and inter with ATT 3, DEF 1 and INI 4 (3-1-4), so he can outmaneuver the opponent? Or shall he regenerate 1 attack and 1 defense dice and enter the fight with 4-2-2? On the other hand, in the second semifinal Gannicus had an easy fight against Rhaskos and has lost only 2 defense dice. So he enters the finals with an overall of 4-2-4 and easily regenerates back to his full strenght of 4-4-4. Gannicus has a clear advantage, in this case and the Spartacus-player may have some angry glances to the host, who made up the semifinal pairings, anticipating this.
However - equipment is unexhausted before the final and can be used again. The winner of the final gets +1 Favour and +1 Influence.
3. That's itPuh - this was a long posting. However - I hope, some of you had some fun to read it and would be happy to get your comments. We had a lot of fun with this house-rules, maybe some of you will like some of them too?..
