Thematically Designed Mechanisms in Stonemaier Games

[@davidgreaves4525]

One non-SM game I find delightfully thematic especially given it's euro-ish feel is Grand Austria Hotel. It is designed in such a way that I can explain almost any mechanism relative to the theme. First, your guests come to your lobby and enjoy the restaurant before their room is ready (but only if you have a free table!), which leads naturally into explaining how rooms work, and that they need to be prepared to hold guests - and then they become unoccupied and new rooms need to be prepared instead. Oh, and you can hire staff to help out and make things better at the hotel. The loop is very satisfying and fun to teach and play out. I really feel like a hotelier!

[@TheSpizer]

I love teaching Viticulture (especially with the Tuscany board) because I find the theme comes through SO WELL in the mechanisms. I tell people “just think through actually running a vineyard and work backwards. You want to sell wine. Well, you need wine first. How do you get wine? Age grapes. How do you get grapes? Pick them off vines. Well you’ll need vines. And workers to get those vines. And maybe you want to expand? You’ll need more workers. And probably money to hire those workers. And you’ll need a big cellar. And orders.” Once they get that the game flows so well, especially with the layout of the Tuscany board essentially holding their hand through the seasons/stages of making wine.

[@jameystegmaier]

Thank you so much for teaching Viticulture! I think it's great you teaching it thematically.

[@williammathon7135]

Thank you so much for this video ! After our talk about the mech with a crane that lets you get new recruits onboard I’d been crossing my fingers for this type of content. My favourite non-SM thematic mechanism is the red hexes in Quest for ElDorado that let you thin your deck. When I teach it I say they are villages inhabited by cannibals, and therefore you have to sacrifice one of your adventurers to them to go through. It leads to very funny situations when you describe your turn : « My adventurer leads me to this village but I distract the cannibals by throwing my photographer at them so my captain can take us across the river »

[@jameystegmaier]

I really like those hexes too! It's a great choice, especially early in the game, to go out of your way to dump some cards for the rest of the run.

[@dreemweaver6664]

I loved playing Red Rising before, but recently I finally read the first two books of the series. OMG, do I admire the design of Red Rising even more now. The themes from the books is integrated so well in all of the synergy requirements and actions of the cards. So amazing!

[@jameystegmaier]

Thank you so much! I'm glad you're enjoying the books too. :)

[@isaacsmith5731]

I realized a while back that Wingspan is one of the most thematically-designed games I own. Elizabeth did a wonderful job linking the game’s mechanisms with real-life bird characteristics, and thus the game feels very grounded in its theme in a very natural and interesting way. I love how she did it, it’s a great design.

[@jameystegmaier]

I'm endlessly impressed by Elizabeth's ability to design cards in Wingspan around what makes each bird unique.

[@browe]

For me, it's what I like best about Expeditions: the subtle ways card abilities, combos, given hex tiles' art/name/benefits, or worker types all express a coherent narrative quality. Theme here isn't represented by globs of "flavor" text, but emerges from the structures themselves.

[@jameystegmaier]

Thank you! That's what I was aiming for. :)

[@browe]

@@jameystegmaier Cheers! I appreciate your attention to nuanced qualities like this. I want a game's framework, fabric, and functions to enable theme. Another recent example is the Dune: Imperium series--theme out the wazoo, but not because of faff.

[@Ian-R-Wilz]

I have not read the Red Rising books but I love the explanation of how each character was thought out that much for their ability. I think it will make future plays even better. I know this is very unlikely, but would be great to have a book like Wyrmspan about each character to tell us their background and how the are relates to them. Also the time stamp on Smitten is about seconds too far in. You are already talking about it if you go right to the timestamp. I’m serious when this question was sent out. I know you film things in advance so I’m wondering if this was sent out before I was an ambassador.

[@jameystegmaier]

Thanks Ian! I highly recommend the books if you have the chance to read them. :)

[@stefanotacchi7790]

What's an Imperial Class 1 star destroyer doing out there in Expeditions? 😀

[@jameystegmaier]

Different worlds. :)