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<blockquote data-quote="happyhermit" data-source="post: 7090106" data-attributes="member: 6834463">So first off let me explain what I mean by &quot;Asymmetry&quot;. I am not saying&nbsp; this is the correct definition and if anyone knows better terms to&nbsp; describe what I am referring to I would appreciate the ideas, but it's&nbsp; the best fitting commonly used term I know.The particular &quot;Asymmetry&quot; I am referring to is maybe a bit less&nbsp; problematic to explain through other games, the epitome of this might be&nbsp; the recent board game &quot;Captain Sonar&quot; (another example would be &quot;Space&nbsp; Cadets&quot;). In this game individual players are essentially each &quot;playing a&nbsp; different game&quot; by engaging with different mechanics and resource&nbsp; constraints, but they are all working toward the same goal. If you&nbsp; haven't seen a game like this imagine one person on a team playing&nbsp; yahtzee, another playing poker, and the third &quot;Jenga&quot;, but they all were&nbsp; interacting in a way that made sense and working together. Contrast&nbsp; this with games that have lessor degree of this flavour of asymmetry&nbsp; such as games that have &quot;variable player powers&quot; such as &quot;Pandemic&quot;, or&nbsp; with games that have little to no asymmetry such as checkers or most&nbsp; abstract games.Now, what I am explicitly NOT talking about is balance, it is harder to&nbsp; balance a symmetrical game than an asymmetrical one, but it's possible&nbsp; to have very poorly balanced games with very little asymmetry and well&nbsp; balanced games with lots. Differing power levels in games is essentially&nbsp; the same thing and not what I am looking for examples of. For example, a&nbsp; high level PC and a low level PC playing together might indeed be very&nbsp; asymmetrical, but that is not what I am looking for.Hopefully I have explained what I'm looking at enough that the following&nbsp; TTRPG example doesn't cause any issues. The most obvious example for me&nbsp; is D&amp;D, so take 5e and the Wizard vs. the Champion Fighter for an&nbsp; example, at mid-levels. The Wizard has a huge variety of defined&nbsp; abilities written down on their character sheet, they have to choose&nbsp; which abilities (spells) to prepare the day before, they have several&nbsp; resources to manage (spells known, spell slots, concentration, etc.). In&nbsp; contrast the Champion Fighter has almost nothing on their character&nbsp; sheet, aside from HP they have almost no built-in resources to manage.&nbsp; Now once again, all of this is setting balance aside completely, it is&nbsp; entirely possible to make a PC like the Wizard that is under-powered but&nbsp; that is neither here nor there. As an aside I actually like both of&nbsp; these classes a lot, and have had great experiences with the Champion.&nbsp; When I play one I find myself almost never checking the character sheet&nbsp; and improvising a lot of actions, and I have observed similar things in&nbsp; many players, whereas the Wizard spends a lot more time reading.The most obvious example (to me) then of less asymmetry would be 4e. The&nbsp; Wizard and the Fighter have much more similar resource structures for&nbsp; instance as well as defined abilities or powers on their sheet. If it's&nbsp; not clear, I'm not saying that's a bad thing, it just illustrates my&nbsp; point, please don't get hung up on this example and instead try to&nbsp; understand what I am getting at. Maybe this will help, in 4e an example&nbsp; of the type of asymmetry I am looking for could be the &quot;roles&quot; wherein&nbsp; one player could be playing the &quot;control&quot; game and another could be&nbsp; playing the &quot;defender&quot; game, it's just that I am looking for examples in&nbsp; this vein but with for example, widely varying resource structures as&nbsp; well.Anyways, I know this is a long post, but if anyone does bother to read&nbsp; it I would appreciate any good (or not good) examples of this type of&nbsp; design I missed over the years.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="happyhermit, post: 7090106, member: 6834463"] So first off let me explain what I mean by "Asymmetry". I am not saying this is the correct definition and if anyone knows better terms to describe what I am referring to I would appreciate the ideas, but it's the best fitting commonly used term I know. The particular "Asymmetry" I am referring to is maybe a bit less problematic to explain through other games, the epitome of this might be the recent board game "Captain Sonar" (another example would be "Space Cadets"). In this game individual players are essentially each "playing a different game" by engaging with different mechanics and resource constraints, but they are all working toward the same goal. If you haven't seen a game like this imagine one person on a team playing yahtzee, another playing poker, and the third "Jenga", but they all were interacting in a way that made sense and working together. Contrast this with games that have lessor degree of this flavour of asymmetry such as games that have "variable player powers" such as "Pandemic", or with games that have little to no asymmetry such as checkers or most abstract games. Now, what I am explicitly NOT talking about is balance, it is harder to balance a symmetrical game than an asymmetrical one, but it's possible to have very poorly balanced games with very little asymmetry and well balanced games with lots. Differing power levels in games is essentially the same thing and not what I am looking for examples of. For example, a high level PC and a low level PC playing together might indeed be very asymmetrical, but that is not what I am looking for. Hopefully I have explained what I'm looking at enough that the following TTRPG example doesn't cause any issues. The most obvious example for me is D&D, so take 5e and the Wizard vs. the Champion Fighter for an example, at mid-levels. The Wizard has a huge variety of defined abilities written down on their character sheet, they have to choose which abilities (spells) to prepare the day before, they have several resources to manage (spells known, spell slots, concentration, etc.). In contrast the Champion Fighter has almost nothing on their character sheet, aside from HP they have almost no built-in resources to manage. Now once again, all of this is setting balance aside completely, it is entirely possible to make a PC like the Wizard that is under-powered but that is neither here nor there. As an aside I actually like both of these classes a lot, and have had great experiences with the Champion. When I play one I find myself almost never checking the character sheet and improvising a lot of actions, and I have observed similar things in many players, whereas the Wizard spends a lot more time reading. The most obvious example (to me) then of less asymmetry would be 4e. The Wizard and the Fighter have much more similar resource structures for instance as well as defined abilities or powers on their sheet. If it's not clear, I'm not saying that's a bad thing, it just illustrates my point, please don't get hung up on this example and instead try to understand what I am getting at. Maybe this will help, in 4e an example of the type of asymmetry I am looking for could be the "roles" wherein one player could be playing the "control" game and another could be playing the "defender" game, it's just that I am looking for examples in this vein but with for example, widely varying resource structures as well. Anyways, I know this is a long post, but if anyone does bother to read it I would appreciate any good (or not good) examples of this type of design I missed over the years. [/QUOTE]

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