How to play Gridcannon: a single player game with regular playing cards

Update: I've improved the rules to add more strategy, be less fiddly, and have a less weird scoring system! Read what's changed and why, and let me know if you try them: www.pentadact.com/2019-08-20-...
- Original description -
Came up with this on Sunday, and with one tweak from me and another from my friend Chris Thursten, it's playing pretty well now! Here are the full rules: www.pentadact.com/2019-08-20-...
If you get it, you might notice I slip up and fail to kill the king of clubs when he should have died, but I re-kill him with the next play so it's fine. I was tired.

[@javipok]

This was randomly recommended to me by KZbin by I’m glad I clicked.

[@owenscott4206]

same

[@jackfeger7634]

Same

[@phoenixplasma1065]

dude same

[@grug2085]

@@phoenixplasma1065 dudes shut the fuck up nobody gives a shit

[@malikbenslimane2873]

it took me 6 minutes to realise it was Tom Francis

[@JoshKit]

"You know we're trying to kill the Royals" - Tom Francis, 2k19

[@NoNameAtAll2]

january 5th, remember

[@satkum2101]

-french basically always

[@ExarchNZ]

The British Crown would like to know your location.

[@andrepaulsen2660]

@@NoNameAtAll2 was this filmed January the fifth?

[@NoNameAtAll2]

@@andrepaulsen2660 Google "queen January 5th"

[@RadicalPi32]

2 player mode: Play as usual, but each player chooses a color. The players then take turns drawing from the deck and killing each other's royals while also trying to protect their own. Wipe out the enemy royals to win. 4 players. Every player has a suit and as long as they have a royal alive (either on the field or in the deck) they keep playing. I'd assume this would lead to interesting alliances and betrayals. I'd also suggest changing the function of the jokers. I have a few ideas that I think could all work together. Upon drawing a joker choose one of the following actions: 1) They trigger a reset of armor on a selected royal after which the armor card(s) and joker return to the bottom of the deck. 2) They allow you to switch the places of any two royals (armor goes with a royal and a dead royal is still a viable choice) on the field and then place the joker on the bottom of the deck. 3) They can be placed on a royal and act as a one-use shield with a health of 10. Upon a successful hit, they are returned to the bottom of the deck. 4) The joker can be placed atop any stack, triggering any adjacent cannons and setting the value to 2. 5) Shuffle the deck and then place the joker on the bottom. I'd also disable the hard reset rule. An unplayable card always becomes armor according to standing rules (to the most similar royal). The joker mods I suggested would prevent cards from being indestructible as they will usually be returned to the deck and allow the possibility of an armor reset. One final rule edit (for multiplayer only) is if it comes to your turn and the deck is empty you must choose one of your royals to sacrifice and then take up the adjacent stack to use as the deck. This would guarantee a bloody and intense finally to the game, as well as open up opportunities for interesting strategy. (Forgive any grammar issues or terrible formatting. I typed this up on my phone)

[@RadicalPi32]

Just tried it with my wife... It got annoying when all the stack values got too high. I'll try to reconfigure the rules to make the flow better

[@laironemaselino2524]

Just an idea if making the game multiplayer becomes too hard. Try reversing the roles of the king and jack whilst keeping each’s royal’s health the same

[@tophatguy3206]

I was think of just spitting the deck in half randomly

[@ithalathegayguy]

I was thinking making jokers the only 2 cards that'll put a stack back in the deck (making that an extremely important decision) and aces just go on any stack you want them to

[@GrimmF21]

What if the Joker is still just like the Ace but just doesn't trigger any cannons? This would probably be better for single player.

[@kaitengiri]

I can immediately tell when I've seen a good game when 5 minutes after having the rules explained to me by the creator, I'm already invested enough to start yelling "YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG! PLAY THERE! PLAY THERE!!"

[@raskr8137]

Every card game can be singleplayer if you're insane enough

[@gavin5410]

Lmao

[@rhizome550]

my favourite is single player hold 'em

[@PutesValdovas]

After some single-player monopoly you would start hating youself more than you did before.

[@genzu6388]

Me playing 12 man poker: Me: "Check" Myself: "All in." The rest of me's: "Whhhyyyy??" *reluctantly places all chips into middle* Spoilers, I lost.

[@thedarklord5129]

I am insane enough. I even did some variations to solitaire and pyramid so that I always win them.

[@anonimouse5533]

Gridcannon (alternate title: Regicide) seems super cool!

[@LimitedWard]

What about Get Down Mr. President?

[@jonsta_6486]

Anoni Mouse I was thinking more like GridLocked, to keep the original name and essentially you can lock yourself and become unable to defeat a royal

[@anonimouse5533]

@@jonsta_6486 that title works, but unfortunately loses the whole "eat the rich" angle i was going for, so seems a bit mixed results to me

[@wesfreneaux9728]

Guillotine

[@anonimouse5533]

@@wesfreneaux9728 YES! Instant yes.

[@YoshisaurUnderscore]

Wow, this is really cool! I think I've found my new favorite solitaire game.

[@youreprettygood1414]

I submitted your game on Boardgamegeek and gave full credit to you and Chris! I hope you don't mind.

[@thomasi.4981]

Hope he sees this

[@toreger2852]

This is a sweet proof of genuine passion for gamedesign :))

[@MaskedTai]

13:40 - You got the King of Clubs here, not on your next play! 17:12 - And the Jack of Diamonds here! Neat card game dude.

[@naxospade]

I think 17:12 is a double kill on Jack of Diamonds and the Jack of Clubs, aye?

[@MaskedTai]

@@naxospade Yep! I missed that too, hahaha.

[@PhilipBlyth]

@@naxospade Yup!

[@noahryden5776]

I was really frustrated by this when watching

[@MrSirFluffy]

Dude this confused me the whole vid, I thought I was missing a rule. Glad to know it was just an error.

[@johnlawlor7931]

I watched the whole thing thinking you were explaining a neat cardgame; you should have led with the fact that you INVENTED this. So cool!

[@tomlopez6042]

The extras I’ve used are: Can’t reset a pile twice (stops infinites), no shame piling (have to armour), and if the deck runs out, you lose. Rather difficult actually.

[@hirostroud]

Really like the look of this. To really fit in the Tom Francis theme though, when you win the game the royals get defenestrated

[@Silverback947]

You gotta love the english language for having a word like defenestration, but no word for the day after tomorrow.

[@NinjarioPicmin]

@לביא גלזמן from what i've heard noone uses it tho

[@NinjarioPicmin]

@לביא גלזמן lol this is so weir i think because of your username youtube makes me write right to left

[@NinjarioPicmin]

@לביא גלזמן no problem it is just so weird, everytime i stop it puts the cursor at another position and it is almost mirroring everywhere :D when i do signs like a .,!?it first displays them on the completely other side . also my dog was adfenestrated beforemorrow you fool :P

[@Silverback947]

@@NinjarioPicmin There is a word for beforemorrow. Today.

[@duartecruz5635]

Well, the game is fun, but it needs a few losing conditions. For example: >The deck somehow runs out. >There's 8 or more armour in the field. >The royals have received 12 or more armour throughout the whole game. >There are 6 or more shame points in the shame zone. At least these are the ones I've been using.

[@estevanphillips6889]

Haven't tried yet, but you could choose to remove either the jokers or the aces from the deck for fewer opportunities to reset piles, right? As long as you have two resets you can always recover, albeit with a very limited deck if you want to continuously recover the other ace/joker. You could perhaps say each pile can only be reset once? Without setting an arbitrary limit, the amount of armor on a single royal for a guaranteed loss varies for value and suit, but so long as any royal has 20 or more health, it's a guaranteed loss. You could treat armor as adding twice the value of the card in health so that a 4 or higher is a likely loss. Just a few ideas.

[@adognamedsally]

I just gave it a shot and I agree. I think the jokers make the game a bit too easy. Though perhaps you could just say that you will always beat the game, but your remaining deck count is your score. I just finished a game with 8 cards remaining in my deck for example.

[@Solrex_the_Sun_King]

Isely Mills so you would remove the value of shame cards from that number. So, if you shamed a 3 of diamonds, and had 5 cards at the end, your score would be 2. Maybe add a multiplier for removing the jokers.

[@Vearru]

I have a better idea, there is only one loss condition and that is the deck running out of cards. Shame no longer is a point system that counts against you but is more of a dead pile. When you put a card in that pile you reset the stack with the most cards in it by adding it to that pile. So as the game goes on you end up with less and less cards to use especially if you can’t kill the royals before they start getting armour.

[@Nahtanojrepus]

here's a thought: If you reset a stack that already has a reset card in it (either through a reset card or a hard reset), the reset card in that stack goes into the shame pile. Takes out the infinite sustain while not putting a harsh limit on the length of the game - the goal of the game is a significant enough task that I feel your harsh restrictions will too often force plays that make the game progress slowly and thus potentially make the game unwinnable. This way there's also further strategy to resets - you have a limited number of non-hard resets, but resetting large stacks gives you more resources to work with

[@ChrisWCorp]

I don't know how I found this video (thanks KZbin algorithm!) but I love the idea of this game, especially being a single player card game, and I can't wait to give it a try!

[@AxionSurge]

Holy moly. I came here from clear the dungeon, and I heard 3 seconds of the voice before I realised. Absolute legend Tom! Thanks for all your amazing crate and crowbar work! Not to mention the awesome PC games!

[@DorkingtonHacker]

"A single player game with regular playing cards." That's some AAA rebranding of patience right there.

[@claytopiaw485]

Your profile picture looks like the dude from "Her"

[@senoreverything6366]

@@claytopiaw485 oh hey it IS Joaquin Phoenix!!

[@senoreverything6366]

Joaquin!!!

[@DorkingtonHacker]

@@senoreverything6366 okay, okay, keep it down. I don't want the whole world to know.

[@senoreverything6366]

@@DorkingtonHacker my b my b

[@tjgrembowski]

I watched this video a couple weeks ago and now I am OBSESSED with this game. It’s so much fun! Thank you for this.

[@grokfail]

This is quite good! I’ve played 2 games so far! If you lay a joker or an ace during the setup phase, I think they should always go straight to the bottom of the deck.

[@hantuchblau]

Fun game! It has a surprising amount of deck building involved since the aces/joker's let you control what is left in your deck toward the end. This allows you to increase the density of joker's as the game goes on so that you don't run out of options. I think long term this would need something incentivizing risk taking. Maybe giving score for destroying armor since that gives incentive to have high-numbered stacks early which makes joker hoarding less rewarding? Currently keeping joker's in small piles early to cycle then back in seems like the dominant strategy.

[@MattWard1]

Hantuchblau , you may want to check out my comments in this thread

[@JohnDeStefano]

Just gave this a try. Very cool and fun! Was on the ropes several times but ended up winning on my first try. Thanks!

[@zilvarro5766]

Here is my variant: Aces do not reset, but you can place them on top of any stack. Both Jokers are royals, they are placed in the upper corners before the game starts. A joker is killed when you have 3 cards of identical rank on its diagonal. (Note that in this case you do not need to place the opposite side last.) The card just played also counts towards the payload. You cannot shoot a cannon if one of the payloads is empty. You may chose not to kill a royal even if you could. Whenever a royal is killed, the three top cards of its row/column/diagonal (including the one you just played) are removed and put on a seperate discard-pile. You can kill multiple royals with the same play. There is no shame pile. If there is no living royal besides jokers, armor will be attached to the next royal that shows up. Jokers can not get armor, armor goes in the discard pile after its royal is defeated. Once the draw pile is empty you can shuffle the discard pile and continue playing with it. Win condition: Defeat all royals including both jokers. Your score is the total amount of cards in your draw and discard pile. Lose conditions: Running out of cards. A royal has more than 30 health. Unable to play a card when all non-joker royals are defeated. I made some more adjustments to the health system and a neat combo system, but for starters just giving all royals 18 health works fine.

[@TheBasikShow]

Zilvarro Out of interest, what is this “neat combo system” you speak of?

[@zilvarro5766]

@@TheBasikShow Combos: If this allows you to defeat 2 or more enemies simultaneously, the card played being the middle card of a line is also okay. If this allows you to defeat 3 or more enemies simultaneously, the last card can be any card in the line. Chains: Whenever one or more royals are killed, if after removing all relevant cards there appears a valid line that did not deal enough damage before, it is also triggered.

[@emanuelecerri8806]

My friend, you just taught me my new favorite solitaire. Thank you so much

[@misterproject8]

Just tried this game out. It's as fun as it looks! Great game, Tom!

[@Dahras1]

This game is super cool and elegant! I especially like it with the rule changes you posted. I think another cool twist on the game (probably too complicated without a specialized deck, but we) would be using a tarot deck, and then each of the Major Arcana could have their own special effect.

[@tyhodges1206]

You just came up with this recently? This is fantastic! I think I might try to borrow/piggyback some of the mechanics to help with my card game I’m working on.

[@jimminyjimson8171]

What a cool original game. Thanks guys. Finally an alternative to solitare! Nice instructive vid too, you've earned a subscriber here.

[@cypherdras]

I’m currently on holiday in Spain and wanted to play a card game, suddenly I remembered this from Reddit like 2 years ago. I look forward to playing it, I hope this is the latest version of the rules :)

[@ConstantChaosGames]

This is a great game. I have designed a few games with a standard deck of cards, and it has been a difficult but rewarding process. Thanks!

[@liviousgameplay1755]

As I kept playing this awesome game, I made my own variation with a more present losing condition. Instead of having Armor/Shame when you have a card to low, there is a "blood pile." If a card is too low for your board, it goes there automatically. One way to get rid of them is each time you kill a royal, you get one back (your choice). However, when you draw an ace/joker, you have to use it on one of your bleed cards FIRST, then use that card for the replacement. Those aces/jokers go to a "ruin pile" and they cannot be retrieved by any means. If you bleed too much you will run out of cards with no way to get them back, and when you run out of cards, you lose the game. I think it makes the game much more fun because, since you never shuffle the deck, you are trying to manipulate it so that you don't bleed. (I also took out Jokers for more challenge)

[@bluburroni7615]

Quote. I like this.

[@liviousgameplay1755]

@@bluburroni7615 Thanks. :p

[@anson7776]

Wonderful premise and well thought out execution. I can definitely see myself playing this as a fun alternative to Solitaire.

[@NiramBG]

Something you didn't go over in the video is how do you calculate your points at the end of the game and how does the shame pile lose you the game?

[@DreamLogic26]

Id assume the shame pile is like a score but you want to get the lowest score possible

[@Flurb]

I feel like the shame pile should represent damage to the player. Like a casualty during a battle or something. You could maybe take 2 or 3 damage before you lose the game.

[@100dead]

I believe that the best score you can get in Gridcannon is 0. You can only lose points, using the aforementioned shame pile.

[@nexusvoid367]

Say you run out of cards and there is a King, a Queen, a Jack and 2 cards in the SHAME Pile... Jack +1 point. Queen +2 points. King +3 points. SHAME cards 2 x 1 point. In total 8 points and winner (if you were playing side-by-side with a friend for instance) is decided by golf rules, in other words, the LEAST points wins. Arguably the SHAME cards could be modified slightly point-wise - considering this example game, they maybe should be worth 2 points instead - or perhaps they scale? 1 SHAME card is only 1 point, but 2 SHAME cards means each is worth 2 points (i.e. a total of 4 points) - this would then mean that SHAME is exponentially damaging... which I think fits quite well... In other words - 1 SC - 1 point / 2 SC - 4 points / 3 SC - 9 points / 4 SC - Instant loss. NOTE: 4 SC would equate to 16 points, which is equal to all four Kings AND all four Jacks still being left alive - there is not point in even continuing with 4 SC.

[@rezanajdi6165]

Nexus Void What if you play against someone and you both get no shame. You need a tiebreaker

[@PhilRennie]

That's a great solitaire, had to jump straight to playing a hand, which I only just won with 5 cards left in the hand. My personal twist for the future might be to score each round on the total of my remaining cards, minus any shame.

[@nils3939]

Subtract shame, add defeated armor?

[@quintopia]

I did the same, but I won on literally the last card left.

[@buggarug]

Wow super surprised that this doesn't have millions of views. Love the video and super interesting idea

[@leonardoalese5516]

Very elegant idea. Thanks for sharing!

[@youreprettygood1414]

I absolutely love solitaire card games and this is a good one. Please make more. Thank you!

[@ErasmasExpeditions]

This looks like a really badass game! Definitely putting this into my repertoire for those times when I want to play a card game and solitarie just won't do!

[@rdh288]

Don't read this if you don't want strategies to make the game easy. Well, I've played several games, winning all but the first without shame cards. The trick is to use Ace and Joker cards on each other over and over, keeping three or four in the deck until absolutely necessary, while piling every unneeded card on the ones in play. It Lets you stall while the royalty is coming out. Makes the game really easy. Also, when you are wasting other cards, keep them on as few piles as possible, so that you can pick them up with just a couple Ace/Jokers. The way you pick cards back up organizes cards from small to large, which makes this easy to sustain. Maybe "easy mode" can be as described in the video, "medium" can be remove one joker, and "hard" can be no jokers. Haven't tried those modifications out yet, though.

[@brianolsen5435]

Hard mode: When you reset a pile, shuffle it before adding it the back of your deck.

[@ringkichard]

I wonder if reversing the order you pick up reset cards would solve this. It would put the older Ace/Joker on the bottom of the deck below the high cards, and prevent you from re-stacking the picked up cards in the same order. Reversing a pile is less fiddly than shuffling. Here are some other ways to increase difficulty: -- Start the game with a joker in the center of the grid. -- Armor cards count for *all* royals for the rest of the game, and killing a royal clears all armor of that royal's suit. -- Aces can still be played onto any pile, and still have a value of 1, but they don't return cards to your deck. Or, they only return cards to your deck if playing the ace kills a royal.

[@SimonDoer]

I've played quite a few rounds by now and I must say, this is really fun. Although I think it is a bit too easy to win with this set of rules, so I started to include a scoring system in my games. Here's what I came up with: -unplayable cards allways get used as armor -excess damage is being counted towards your score For example: a Jack has an additional armor of 2 (hp=13). You kill him with 10+7 damage, so your point total for this attack is 17-13=4 -different royals give different score multipliers: Jack has a multiplier of x1, Queen x1.5, King x2 E.g.: A king has no armor and you deal 16 damage to him. (16-13)*2=6. So your total score for this attack is 6 -at the end of the game you just add together the scores of your attacks. the maximum score you can get is therefore 132. You lose if: -you run out of cards -a royal has more hp than you can deal damage to him. With a scoring system, the player is more incentivised to play risky, as it is not only about winning, but also about scoring. I've played 2 rounds with this scoring system, and couldn't win either, because I got way too greedy :P In my opinion it is alot more fun this way.

[@vasco407]

that looks to be really fun. thank you for sharing : D there is not a lot of single player games of cards or board games, that i know of this is so cool : D

[@macksatt]

This is awesome! Can't wait to see it on Shut Up & Sit Down. Quinns would love this.

[@deerlyderby6967]

Definitely a card game that doesn’t suck!

[@TopSpot123]

Pretty clever, I like it! I've been kicking around a competitive game with a functionally similar 'add two cards to eliminate the royal' mechanic for a decade now. I need to try to work mine out. I would love to see some rule variations that could turn this into a competitive game. Perhaps taking turns with each player guarding their color royal. I think you would need more reset conditions, two's as well, perhaps. Anyway, I'm just spitballing. Great work!

[@Alex-wl1sp]

You would need more rules surrounding armor too. It would be possible to put a 9 on a king, and it would be impossible to kill it. Maybe you could leverage that though, since it would be a lot harder to do that.

[@TopSpot123]

@@Alex-wl1sp Destructoid made a post about this and Ricky Namara made some good suggestions for competitive variant in the comments as well. www.destructoid.com/the-creator-of-gunpoint-and-heat-signature-has-made-a-strategy-game-using-a-regular-deck-of-cards-564503.phtml

[@BobixIX]

@@Alex-wl1sp Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I think the highest value of armour that can possibly be played is 7, because the highest possible board value is four 10s, four 9s, and an 8, which means you can play the other three 8s on the 8 that's already on the board. If you're playing with it where pieces of armour add up, then that can be a problem, but I think if you're playing where each royal can only have 1 piece of armour, there's no chance that something becomes un-killable.

[@UsaginoNivix]

this is the coolest thing ever !!! you sir are a genius !! such a cool idea !! this may as well be the best solo card game ever

[@alastairvanmaren5243]

I love you, Tom. Thanks for sharing this with us :D

[@lunaticdancer4596]

That's a very nice design, a lot of push and pull in the game's mechanics, great job!

[@aanshuk]

Yay! A single player card game that is actually fun! (And not just a version of solitare!) Thank you for this video!

[@billycobs7883]

Thank you Mr. Tom Francis. I'm one step closer towards enlightened

[@AliciaMarkoe]

I feel so lucky. I was looking for a solitaire game that would work with my deck that is missing a card... found this video. If i had been two months earlier I might never have found this excellent game!

[@nicklowe1964]

Looks great, man!

[@Torcher999]

Dark mode is best mode.

[@DonGeritch]

played with it a bit, it's fun, but I needed extra chalage so I changed it a bit: - you loose when you have 3 shame cards - health of royals is doubled - when you trigger a payload the trigger card value also counts towards the attack, and it's color and suit also matters - when you run out of the cards (which I did twice in one of the games) you loose unless you scored a kill on that turn. If you did, you may reset a cell on the grid and use those cards to continue.

[@hakemz.]

Damn, I love your cards skin 🔥

[@kallethen9389]

This is a brilliant solitaire game! It's got simple rules and involves a good amount of strategy and doesn't feel like you are simply beholden to luck.

[@Zynh0722]

You’ve inspired me, I’m currently working on making a simple p5 based web app to play this game. It won’t be much, but the goals are to simply replicate what was show here Stretch goals are to implement some of the losing conditions suggested in the comments as options, whether or not I get to this is based on how much I enjoy making it. I may even make a full unity based version if the p5 prototype turns out well

[@SoyOscarRangel]

Amazing game idea, I absolutely loved it and will be trying it soon, I'd love to play several matches to test bad deals, and might even change a couple rules to make it harder to win, since it seems you can win 100% of the time :)

[@mountfoolish]

Great idea for a solo game! My only suggestion would be to nix the Shame pile and instead Revive a Royal if you don't want to add armor to a living one. Then you would place the unplayable card underneath your deck. If you don't remember which dead royal was where, this could be a real gotcha moment if you accidentally revive a King.

[@joebarker5560]

I've been playing a variant where you split the royals from the deck and place all the royals around the grid from the start. I think this simplifies the game a lot and makes the winning condition killing all the royal before you run out of cards. Ive been scoring by adding the total of my unused cards together after a win and just giving a loss if you cant play a card or run out of cards without killing all the royals

[@dilexar]

A great theme for this would be French Revolution. All the lower class need to rise up and work together to eliminate the royals, with more important royals requiring more strategy

[@Bobstew68]

Yeah. Maybe the card game could simply be called "revolution"?

[@Flurb]

"Red, the blood of angry men! Black, the dark of ages past!"

[@sortiapricefield2303]

@@Bobstew68 that's what i'm gonna call it if i show it to anyone. xD

[@TopKekus-Maximus]

This was fascinating, will definitely try ot out

[@AdorkableSmile]

What a neat card game! Love finding new solitaire games - and what are the cards you use? They look beautiful!

[@chrisprice8112]

I just found them! Search 'Joyoldelf 54Pcs Poker Playing Cards Black Deck of Poker Card with Rose Pattern' on amazon (seems to nbe the only place they sell)

[@verbatos9498]

Thank you KZbin recommendations!

[@thefleepo8013]

Thank you, an excellent way to make a use of my playing cards since I have no friends

[@Giraftery]

This is like a better solitaire for me. Can't wait to try it out and maybe add my own twist to it. Thanks!

[@minch333]

This seems like a really great game! Gonna try it out

[@Rockythetigre]

Ohh that sounds super fun! Will definitely try it out

[@quantumpotato]

Cool looking game, I'll try this out. I'm glad to see innovation with limited components.

[@captainclipy6236]

Saw this video in my recommended. Happened to have my deck of cards next to me. It’s 12:08 at night and this is my new favourite game

[@lfestevao]

Wow, I am so in love with this game concept. Suggestions: 0. Reclaimed cards go to a spare deck to be reshuffled when the current one is finished instead of the bottom (avoids sequence repeat) 1. After killing one of the royals, allow to pick one of the 3 cards used to be removed into a points stack. Player can get more points and lose a powerful card or fewer but less chance of giving armor. Also frees one space. 2. Allow the armors to be chipped away. If a king gets a 5+ armor it will be a pain to beat him in one shot. So you could use successive strikes to win. E.g. K+5 gets a canonball worth 11, it loses the +5 but the extra 6 damage is lost. 3. Chipped armor counts as negative points BUT royals defeated with armor in single shot give the armor as bonus points. Added challenge for players wanting higher scores.

[@lfestevao]

It can be made into a 2 player mode if each one gets the beaten cards into his own score. Added competition for locking some hits for late game.

[@lfestevao]

It also can have a "planned" mode, just by adding a hand with X cards, I think 3 would be nice to add some strategy but not completely bust the gambling part of having to chose a placement with incomplete information.

[@lfestevao]

And a quick or learning game mode with cards 5 to 10 in a grid 2x2, in which the trigger would also count into the payload.

[@ascendantking34]

I actually like this a lot, thank you very much

[@jjmrowdy]

Wouldn't playing that 6 of Clubs at around 17:00 kill one or both of the Jack of Diamonds // Jack of Clubs? Really cool game!

[@metaljesus6667]

James Mueller I was looking at it and I think he was trying to keep the top left a spade so he could kill the king which, as you may know, is much harder to kill than a jack

[@tears_of_asariel3198]

@@metaljesus6667 the OP is talking about the move he actually made, it should have killed both of the jacks, but he just missed it (he also misses a kill on the king of clubs at 13:35)

[@Syrahl696]

2 moves later he kills both those jacks when he places a 10 in the same spot. Yes, the 6 would have killed them, but in this game him forgetting to do it didn't change anything in the long run. It was just a minor slip up on his end, and he makes similar mistakes at other points in the video.

[@tears_of_asariel3198]

@@Syrahl696 i dont think the OP was trying to criticize or anything, they just wanted clarification for when they play the game themselves

[@kattattack1857]

Oh my good gracious me. This game is just… I love it. Regicide, single player, (optional multiplayer from one of the comments), and a really interesting and unique game! It’s so cool!

[@Aquila009]

I love it. I am going to be playing this a lot.

[@Aquila009]

One idea, maybe. I am someone who does not really mind about points at the end of games like these, so a shame pile of negative points is just... meh. What if the shamepile is actually compiled of the entire pile you hard reset. That way, failure becomes a lot more likely, and it’s more of a win or fail kind of thing. I never did anything like this before, so this is just an idea, since I already really like this.

[@theta1672]

Fun-looking single player card game that only requires a regular deck of cards? I'm in! We need more stuff like this on the internet!

[@saint6034]

Love the game man. Honestly, it's brilliant. The Shame pile seems odd as a solitaire game is really more so a puzzle. A point system doesn't serve a purpose. the armor system i think fits perfect. Adds a penalty for drawing a dead card, which makes the player has to play around keeping stacks low. If you added a system in which the lowest hitpoint, similar, royal gets the armor it sort of automates the mechanic evenly. So if a Jack already has 2 armor and the dead card is a same suit 3, it would go on the queen. IDK if that'd work exactly, but something along those lines. It'll need some testing. Awesome concept!

[@TheHopperUK]

This is great! Cheers.

[@yogzoth]

This looks sweet. About to give it a try.

[@yogzoth]

Welp, now I'm hooked.

[@boggers]

Tried a couple of games. Another idea / variant for you: No shame pile, so placing armour is mandatory (I prefer the name "support") when a card can not be played in the centre, however the player has a choice of where to play the support, and support cards can be stacked on a royal even if it makes them impossible to kill. Jokers do not reset centre piles, and must be placed as armour (of value 1), however Jokers can be used to reset existing support piles, setting the support value to 1. In practice, if you get 2 jokers very early you might be stuck, but when this does happen, you can use one joker to reset the other.

[@bananabajanana4599]

I like to count the cards left in my deck when i finish and count that as my score (every card in the pile of shame is a negative one to the score) and that gives a new motive to try to reset the big piles and sometimes even hard reseting can help you in the long run.

[@grimzombieapocalypse1484]

Actually pretty fun game to be honest. Super impressed

[@Minenik2]

Truly inspiring

[@dawnbray8325]

The cards you use look really good

[@alexboru2234]

I watching the video I was thinking that would the end just cycle infinitely with aces until a win, then when I tested I won with my last card, well done sir

[@Meklein]

very cool game, thank you for showing it to the world

[@lightmonkey1221]

This is so cool!

[@koreanelixir]

It looks like a nice card game! Definitely interested in doing by myself and maybe teaching to my friends! Just as a small suggestion, maybe some kind of score can be calculated at the end for competition purposes? Though it kinda heavily relies on luck, somekind of score can show how much better you make decisions than, i guess, your friend. Also the "shame pile" concept will be clearer by just subtracting the score at the end. But on one side, it kinda seems hard to come up with a fair enough score system since the number of cards in the deck or field can change quite frequently.

[@heatshield]

Cool. I like it. Interesting decision to return cards to the bottom without shuffling. I'll have to play a few that way, and shuffling all cards once running out to see the difference.

[@benh6064]

Tom "take a break from developing your game to develop a game" Francis Also, I feel like Jokers should let you pick up the stack, but Aces just go on top. Might be an interesting alternate rule

[@MussoGames]

Super clever! Great idea, can’t wait to try it out and share it with some friends! Wonder if there’s a way to make this two player

[@miainsel6577]

I love the tutorial l. Your cards are beautiful by the way.

[@LyricWulf]

It's not assassination, it's surprise Gridcannon.

[@steveydoesglasgow]

just played a game, thought it was really cool. The resets seem really powerful, so it might be worth toning them down a little by not letting them shoot the cannon? I may have just had a good deal so I’m worrying about nothing. Anyways, really cool, going to be playing this a good bit in the future I think. Thanks!

[@MrWeebable]

Good game! Curious to find what the average winning chance is

[@mercylessplayer]

Thisis so convoluted i love it

[@waaaaaaah5135]

Really like the idea!

[@sammysammyson]

This is pretty well-designed and I'm about to play it haha

[@4cqker]

this is great and all but will there ever be a sequel/gadget update for Heat signature :D

[@thedarklord5129]

Such a cool name for a card game.

[@elfgohan]

I made some slight adjustments to make it a little harder. 1st: no shame pile, only armor. If a piece gets more than 20 points in armor you lose automatically. Also no jokers, so you only have the 4 aces to reset piles. That made it much more strategic.

This game is awesome! Thanks! :)

[@KC-pw7dv]

thanks for this!