To the 'Game of Thrones' bit. All of the book titles of the series that the TV show is based on, follow the same pattern: 'A Game of Thrones, 'A Clash of Kings', 'A Storm of Swords, etc. I don't think it's a coincidence that this game is called 'A War of Whispers'
Agree with your points on this one, I really enjoy it. I think it suffered from a limited initial release with a follow up print run just going into covid, limiting how many copies ended up in gamers' hands.
Robert got to play aWoW as shared about it recently on the podcast. He was also stunned how great the game was and how he managed to miss this one for so long.
Good call on the GoT influence. From the designer "stemmed from my love of Game of Thrones and is my attempt to approach a traditional conflicty area control game from the perspective of Varys or Littlefinger."
This game is fantastic! My son (11) liked taking hordes of armies he wanted to weaken and just crashing them against towers or stronger forces whenever he could. Definitely made him feel mischievous.
This game looks fun, thank you for sharing about it! It reminds me of Dogs of War as you’re trying to influence different groups while not being in control of any of them there too.
I don't know who often you read comments... The game without expansions was quite expansive and I am still thinking whenever I should buy it. I initially wanted to make a different version of it but instead of armies having an elemental summons that fight one another, but then again without remodeling the map and possibly the way cities and towers work (not mentioning cards) it would be hard to make it its own beast. So the idea of taking a game and switching the theme to create a different one with similar mechanics...
Hi Jamey, been awhile since I last committed on one of your videos. I work at a behavioral hospital and was talking with one of the therapists about how it would be interesting to have game therapy. In essence, have certain virtues or lessons within the core of the game play. Such as deception games helping those with trust issues, or cooperative telling them it's okay to ask for help. Games allow them to pratice in a consquence free environment, if they mess up it won't alter their mental stability. They said they will consider my proposal if I can make up a two week schedule to cycle through. This can range from child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric patients. Do you have any suggestions of what games could teach these skills and lessons? Even mindfully playing would be accepted because they run mindfulness programs. Last time we talked you were mentioning how you were working as you made viticulture. I've been doing the same, trying to get this project rolling. I feel it could be a great addition to mental health facilities everywhere. I'm sure programs like this exist so I'm going to look that up in a bit. I would love to hear your feedback. Thank you for all your content, I hope to live like you someday and be a professional game designer. You have been quite the inspiration to keep pursuing my goals.
Welcome back, Andrew! That's a great question, and I think there are quite a few games that feature some sort of therapeutic element or lesson. An example I often use with educators are the communication skills at the root of our "Between Two" games. "Just One" is a game that requires you to put yourself in other players' shoes as you try not to write the same word as them. Any game with positive player interaction (I have a full list on my channel) encourages people to think outside of their own self interests. Games like "The Mind" can create the feeling of being truly in sync with others. The list could go on, though I have to get back to work. :) I'd suggest posting the question in one of the board game Facebook group (and potential searching Google or BoardGameGeek for good games to use in therapy and in the classroom)--I'm sure you'll get some great answers there. Good luck!
@@jameystegmaier thank you for your feedback. I also have a game I've been working on for a while now with a friend. It's going to be a semi-cooperative worker placement. The core concept is a weather forecast system with randomly linked animal behaviors to influence or deter to/from certain locations. The players will need to work together to survive the harshships of the planet, or they can let it do its work... I have more to it but I don't feel comfortable putting it all in a comment for people to see. What do you think of the idea?
@@Andrew-qg9ni It's really hard to comment on ideas (see stonemaiergames.com/kickstarter-lesson-204-your-idea-is-brilliant-your-idea-is-worthless/), but what matters most at this stage is that you're excited enough about the idea to bring it to life. Good luck with that process!
@@jameystegmaier I have most of the game worked out, I was just wondering what you thought of that combination of mechanics. The storms will have looming effects pair with how the creatures will act. I planned on having a similar mechanic to architects of west kingdom in which when meeple get attacked they go to a separate zone. If you don't dedicate meeple to go there and rescue them you will lose them permanently the following turn. You could either save them yourself, hope for someone gracious enough to save them, or pay someone to do it. I was also going to have objective cards which you complete by adding a certain number of meeple to a location. This can be difficult because of zones getting locked down by other players. So I made private locations to increase the overall number of spots, but the owner can bargain the resources you'll obtain in order to allow you to go to their spot. I still have more executing. An idea I'm experimenting with is specialized meeple which you unlock by completing quest or purchasing them perhaps. I was going to have a meeple who could lock spots following them. A meeple who could destroy a spot they went to. A meeple who can go to destroyed spots and restore them. I'm still working on this one at the moment so those are all I got. I'm aware that everything is about execution, I just wanted to share that bit. Thank you for the link though, I would definitely of appreciated it had I not been aware of that.
I just played this for the first time yesterday. When I saw your video I was completely unsurprised that it would be a game you'd like. I only played 2 player (which was neat because you placed 3 workers instead of 2) but i really want to try it with more people
I haven't had the chance to try the game yet. I love the concept, I'm just wondering whether you don't risk to have a very imbalanced game if some factions are supported by more players than other?
There's a few house rules with the sorting that can easily fix this (and there's even an app for random unique setups), but in my experience the main thing is you aren't only focused on the winning faction, in this game you want to rig the whole game. Most of the time everyone will be rooting for the same faction (by luck or revealing and switchin the tokens), but the rest of tokens will be different and will make the difference when counting points.
I found the game way TOO balanced. The game ended up being very boring playing out pretty much the same every game. For me it felt like a half baked game.
@@jameystegmaier I guess the worker placement but the main reason I backed it was for the theme. Unfortunately the game didn't live up to the theme for me personally.
To the 'Game of Thrones' bit. All of the book titles of the series that the TV show is based on, follow the same pattern: 'A Game of Thrones, 'A Clash of Kings', 'A Storm of Swords, etc. I don't think it's a coincidence that this game is called 'A War of Whispers'
Yeah seemed pretty legit to me as well
Agree with your points on this one, I really enjoy it. I think it suffered from a limited initial release with a follow up print run just going into covid, limiting how many copies ended up in gamers' hands.
Playing this game tonight for the first time with friends in Cardiff, Wales - a nod to the map you have in the background! Thanks for the video 👍
Nice! :)
Robert got to play aWoW as shared about it recently on the podcast. He was also stunned how great the game was and how he managed to miss this one for so long.
Good call on the GoT influence. From the designer "stemmed from my love of Game of Thrones and is my attempt to approach a traditional conflicty area control game from the perspective of Varys or Littlefinger."
This game is fantastic! My son (11) liked taking hordes of armies he wanted to weaken and just crashing them against towers or stronger forces whenever he could. Definitely made him feel mischievous.
I hadn't heard of this game until a few days ago and was a bit intrigued. Now I'm fully interested!
Yes! War of Whispers! Such a fun game!
This game looks fun, thank you for sharing about it! It reminds me of Dogs of War as you’re trying to influence different groups while not being in control of any of them there too.
That's a perfect comparison!
I don't know who often you read comments...
The game without expansions was quite expansive and I am still thinking whenever I should buy it.
I initially wanted to make a different version of it but instead of armies having an elemental summons that fight one another, but then again without remodeling the map and possibly the way cities and towers work (not mentioning cards) it would be hard to make it its own beast.
So the idea of taking a game and switching the theme to create a different one with similar mechanics...
I read the comments a few times every day. :)
Hi Jamey, been awhile since I last committed on one of your videos. I work at a behavioral hospital and was talking with one of the therapists about how it would be interesting to have game therapy. In essence, have certain virtues or lessons within the core of the game play. Such as deception games helping those with trust issues, or cooperative telling them it's okay to ask for help. Games allow them to pratice in a consquence free environment, if they mess up it won't alter their mental stability. They said they will consider my proposal if I can make up a two week schedule to cycle through. This can range from child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric patients. Do you have any suggestions of what games could teach these skills and lessons? Even mindfully playing would be accepted because they run mindfulness programs. Last time we talked you were mentioning how you were working as you made viticulture. I've been doing the same, trying to get this project rolling. I feel it could be a great addition to mental health facilities everywhere. I'm sure programs like this exist so I'm going to look that up in a bit. I would love to hear your feedback. Thank you for all your content, I hope to live like you someday and be a professional game designer. You have been quite the inspiration to keep pursuing my goals.
Welcome back, Andrew! That's a great question, and I think there are quite a few games that feature some sort of therapeutic element or lesson. An example I often use with educators are the communication skills at the root of our "Between Two" games. "Just One" is a game that requires you to put yourself in other players' shoes as you try not to write the same word as them. Any game with positive player interaction (I have a full list on my channel) encourages people to think outside of their own self interests. Games like "The Mind" can create the feeling of being truly in sync with others. The list could go on, though I have to get back to work. :) I'd suggest posting the question in one of the board game Facebook group (and potential searching Google or BoardGameGeek for good games to use in therapy and in the classroom)--I'm sure you'll get some great answers there. Good luck!
@@jameystegmaier thank you for your feedback. I also have a game I've been working on for a while now with a friend. It's going to be a semi-cooperative worker placement. The core concept is a weather forecast system with randomly linked animal behaviors to influence or deter to/from certain locations. The players will need to work together to survive the harshships of the planet, or they can let it do its work... I have more to it but I don't feel comfortable putting it all in a comment for people to see. What do you think of the idea?
@@Andrew-qg9ni It's really hard to comment on ideas (see stonemaiergames.com/kickstarter-lesson-204-your-idea-is-brilliant-your-idea-is-worthless/), but what matters most at this stage is that you're excited enough about the idea to bring it to life. Good luck with that process!
@@jameystegmaier I have most of the game worked out, I was just wondering what you thought of that combination of mechanics. The storms will have looming effects pair with how the creatures will act. I planned on having a similar mechanic to architects of west kingdom in which when meeple get attacked they go to a separate zone. If you don't dedicate meeple to go there and rescue them you will lose them permanently the following turn. You could either save them yourself, hope for someone gracious enough to save them, or pay someone to do it. I was also going to have objective cards which you complete by adding a certain number of meeple to a location. This can be difficult because of zones getting locked down by other players. So I made private locations to increase the overall number of spots, but the owner can bargain the resources you'll obtain in order to allow you to go to their spot. I still have more executing. An idea I'm experimenting with is specialized meeple which you unlock by completing quest or purchasing them perhaps. I was going to have a meeple who could lock spots following them. A meeple who could destroy a spot they went to. A meeple who can go to destroyed spots and restore them. I'm still working on this one at the moment so those are all I got. I'm aware that everything is about execution, I just wanted to share that bit. Thank you for the link though, I would definitely of appreciated it had I not been aware of that.
I just played this for the first time yesterday. When I saw your video I was completely unsurprised that it would be a game you'd like.
I only played 2 player (which was neat because you placed 3 workers instead of 2) but i really want to try it with more people
That's good to know that it works well with 2 players too! I played it with 3 total players.
It was amusing we both had brown as our -1, they really suffered lol
We played this a few months back and ended in a 4 way tie. No matter our schemes and ploys we all ended up with the same influence at the end.
Love this game!
I haven't had the chance to try the game yet. I love the concept, I'm just wondering whether you don't risk to have a very imbalanced game if some factions are supported by more players than other?
The game accounts for that by letting players switch tokens around (if you do, you reveal the switched tokens and can't move them again).
There's a few house rules with the sorting that can easily fix this (and there's even an app for random unique setups), but in my experience the main thing is you aren't only focused on the winning faction, in this game you want to rig the whole game. Most of the time everyone will be rooting for the same faction (by luck or revealing and switchin the tokens), but the rest of tokens will be different and will make the difference when counting points.
I found the game way TOO balanced. The game ended up being very boring playing out pretty much the same every game. For me it felt like a half baked game.
What was your favorite mechanism in it?
@@jameystegmaier I guess the worker placement but the main reason I backed it was for the theme. Unfortunately the game didn't live up to the theme for me personally.