if you are bored......

One of my lifelong hobbies has been inventing board games. I've been working on one lately that I think is pretty cool but I could use some help rating the "players". (btw-I'd like to make some of my game browser games if any of you are programming whizzes)

The game I'm making now takes historical characters and puts them in an adventure setting. They have to traverse 2000 miles through great jeopardy to get to the finish.

Each of the characters is rated in 22 categories. I've rated them but would love to have someone else rate them as well. The categories are things like "leadership" "navigation" "hand to hand combat" etc. I've got the categories pretty well defined and the rating system.

So if any of you are bored and want to help out---- just PM me .

There are 200 player cards but you could do as few or many as you want. Especially if there are historical characters you believe you know a lot about.

Thanks!

That sounds super interesting but sadly I have too much on my plate right now. Damn it!!

I'd love it if you kept us updated here about the development of the game. And if you need beta testers or do a kickstarter campaign to get the game printed--I'm in!

Oh this sounds really exciting, I'm not sure how much help I can be, but I would be happy to volunteer my time if you need it

Thank you Bekah!

Actually now that I think about it I can post the system here. Then if anyone else wants to join it, it will be here.
This is the rating system

10- Arguably the best in the world in their day
9- very close to a 10, great, but not the best in the world
8- was one of the best in his nation at this
7- was one of the best in a region in this
6- was one of the best in his town at this
5- average
4- below average
3- significantly below average
2- barely able to even do this task
1- almost incapable
0- someone who cannot perform the task

next post I'll show the 22 qualities

Twenty-two qualities

Leadership-The ability to lead people.
Appeal- this is how easily liked the person is to strangers, how attractive they are. This is good for diplomats and charismatic people. 10's might be people like Elvis or Ben Franklin.
Spirituality- this is the ability to evangelize
Bravery- This is how fearless the person is
Problem-Solving- This is sort of a catch-all for overall intelligence and quickness of thought
Decisiveness- The ability to make clear concise decisions, Hamlet would be below a 5 on this
Engineering- The ability to design and plan structures
Mechanical Ability- The ability to invent and to make gadgets (thomas edison or mcgyver would be 10's at this )
Navigation This is a bit of a catch-all. Because of the timelessness. It can be someone who is a great sea captain, but also a great frontiersman or frontier scout, or a great pilot. So Magellan, Meriweather Lewis and Amelia Earhart would all be 10's at this. (oh-astronauts too have this skill)
Administration- The ability to manage resources, stewardship, management. (Jack Welch thinks he's a 10 at this)
Botanical Knowledge- Knowledge of plants and agriculture, natural science
Medicine- Knowledge of medicines and health practices, the ability to heal
Surgery-knowledge of anatomy and the ability to surgically operate
Trading- a bit of a catch all for business acumen
Languages- the knowledge of many languages, I've made monolingual people a 4, unless they were really good at their one language.
Tactics- Military tactics, the ability to plan battles and troop movements
Weapons Combat -The ability to fight with weapons, (a super-soldier like Audie Murphy is a 10)
Hand to Hand Combat- This can pertain to army types but also to athletic types. Muhammad Ali would be a 10, Bruce Lee would be a 10, your decision on whether various soldiers/commandos could stay with them
Physical Endurance- Rating of a persons endurance and toughness. Cross country stars like Paavo Nurmi would be a 10 at this, but also guys who climb Mt. Everest would be 10's at this.
Sprinting Speed- Jesse Owens would be a 10.
Physical Stength-Andre the Giant would be a 10.
Hand-eye Coordination- This is the domain of ballplayers and the very dextrous, Joe DiMaggio and Houdini would both be 10's

All of the ratings are on a male scale but there are lots of women. It really only matters in Physical strength and perhaps hand to hand combat, but remember to grade the women in those categories on a male scale. So for instance despite her being strong for a woman I gave Amelia Earhart a 4 in physical strength.

Here is a list of the people I'm rating. Rate as many of them as you like
Also if there are people that as a player you would want to have that aren't on the list feel free to add them. (This goes for everyone who wants to rate people). There is nothing sacred about the list, half of them are idiosyncratic choices of mine (like Toots Shor lol), and some of the others I let folks add even if I thought they were silly, so if folks add others that is great!

John Brown
Charlemagne
Leonard Da Vinci
Amelia Earhart
Albert Einstein
Ben Franklin
Galileo
John of Gaunt
Doc Holliday
George Marshall
Branch Rickey
Saladin
Malcolm X
Mahatma Gandhi
George Washington
Marie Curie
Thomas Edison
Napoleon
William The Conqueror
Florence Nightingale
Ferdinand Magellan
Nat Turner
Charles Darwin
Richard the Lionheart
Eleanor of Aquitaine
Georgy Zhukov
Attila The Hun
Ghengis Khan
George Patton
Robert E. Lee
Queen Elizabeth I
Abraham Lincoln
Simo Haya
Jack Churchill
Alvin York
Audie Murphy
Joan of Arc
Neil Armstrong
Fred Astaire
Alexander Graham Bell
Marlon Brando
Humphrey Bogart
Al Capone
Charlie Chaplin
Winston Churchill
Christopher Columbus
Bette Davis
Andre The Giant
Charles De Gaulle
James Dean
Princess Diana
Marlene Dietrich
Walt Disney
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Farrah Fawcett
Sigmund Freud
Clark Gable
Yuri Gugarin
Greta Garbo
Judy Garland
Betty Grable
Cary Grant
Che Guevara
Ernest Hemingway
Jimi Hendrix
Henry VII
Audrey Hepburn
Houdini
Grace Kelly
John F. Kennedy
Martin Luther King
Vladimir Lenin
John Lennon
Michelangelo
Marilyn Monroe
Paul Newman
Isaac Newton
Jaqueline Kennedy Onassis
Louis Pasteur
Evita Peron
Elvis Presley
Rasputin
Ronald Reagan
Eleanor Roosevlet
Frank Sinatra
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Josef Stalin
Nicola Tesla
Harriet Tubman
Mark Twain
John Wayne
John Wesley
Brigham Young
Martin Luther
Cardinal Richelieu
Alan Turing
Nicolaus Otto
James Watt
Henry Ford
Benjamin Spock
Teddy Roosevelt
Otto Hahn
James Clerk Maxwell
Charles Lindbergh
Pedro Alvares Cabral
James Cook
John Cabot
Ibn Battuta
Vasco De Gama
St. Francis of Assisi
Amerigo Vespucci
Leif Ericson
Edmund Hilary
Thor Heyderdahl
Ernest Shackleton
Wilt Chamberlain
Jackie Robinson
Emil Zatopek
Pope Sixtus IV
P.T. Barnum
Ray Kroc
J.P. Morgan
John D. Rockefeller
Jonas Salk
Meriwether Lewis
John Gibbon
Joseph Lister
Norman Bethune
Lars Laskell
Nostradamus
Shaka Zulu
Jay Gould
Dashiel Hammet
Paul Robeson
Jacques Cousteau
Paul Revere
Oliver Cromwell
Simon Bolivar
Jesse Owens
Joe Louis
Pancho Villa
Lorenzo Medici
Mayer Rothschild
William Wallace
Moshe Dayan
Davey Crockett
Quanah Parker
Bernard Montgomery
Kenny Washington
Roy Rogers
Wyatt Earp
Geronimo
Arnold Rothstein
John Jacob Astor
Cornelius Vanderbilt
Steve McQueen
Toots Shor
William Powell
Myrna Loy
Giuseppe Garibaldi
Constantine I
Douglas MacArthur
Johnny Carson
Charles Bronson
Daniel Boone
Winfield Scott
Max Schmeling
Kit Carson
Erwin Rommel
Will Rogers
Paavo Nurmi
Bob Mathias
Miyamoto Musashi
Sir Francis Drake
Francisco Pizarro
Hernan Cortes
Shoqan Walikhanov
Nicolas Copernicus
Merian C. Cooper
Tony Zale
Douglas Douglas-Hamilton
Tenzing Norgay
Henry Morton Stanley
William Walker
Roberto Clemente
Cesar Chavez
Santa Ana
Augusto Pinochet
Pablo Escobar
Hugo Chavez
Ho Chi Minh
Mao Tse Tung
Kang Youwei
Wang Anshi
Jim Thorpe
Sequoyah
Sacagawea
Benito Juarez
Chief Joseph
Tecumseh
Sitting Bull
Isoroku Yamamoto
David Livingstone

Shanor mentioned I should add a template. I just made an excel sheet like this.

Charlemagne
Leadership 10
Appeal 6
Spirituality 6
Bravery 9
Problem-Solving 7
Decisiveness 10
Engineering 5
Mechanical Ability 5
Navigation 6
Administration 9
Botanical Knowledge 4
Medicine 5
Surgery 5
Trading 5
Languages 4
Tactics 10
Weapons Combat 8
Hand to Hand Combat 8
Long Distance Running 6
Sprinting speed 6
Physical Strength 8
Hand-Eye Coordination 7


You can't really tell from the paste, but then I would just put another name to the right and the numbers next to it.
If folks use the same format it will be a lot easier to collate

Yeah, I don't see my boy Mo on there (Muammar Gaddafi). He had always been my favorite dictator. Ton a laughs out of that guy.

If I have some free time this weekend I'll try a hand at a few

Shanor wrote:

Yeah, I don't see my boy Mo on there (Muammar Gaddafi). He had always been my favorite dictator. Ton a laughs out of that guy.

YOu know they think he was worth 100 BILLION when he got whacked? Wow.

Hey Daub, here's a show you might enjoy.

Wil Wheaton's Tabletop:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL74EEFBD5C6A4C9DA

That's a cool idea, man!

awesome link Diz I never saw that show. It's a lot of fun Aidann, once you start rating them all it's kind of fun.

This is tough with some of them but I tried out Teddy, I'm sure after doing a bunch it would be easier to compare and figure out exact numbers though.

Teddy Roosevelt
Leadership 9
Appeal 9
Spirituality 5
Bravery 9
Problem-Solving 7
Decisiveness 10
Engineering 6
Mechanical Ability 5
Navigation 7
Administration 7
Botanical Knowledge 6
Medicine 4
Surgery 6
Trading 5
Languages 7
Tactics 7
Weapons Combat 5
Hand to Hand Combat 7
Long Distance Running 5
Sprinting speed 5
Physical Strength 7
Hand-Eye Coordination 7

just as a conversation piece this was my teddy

Teddy
Roosevelt
Leadership 10
Appeal 9
Spirituality 5
Bravery 10
Problem-Solving 8
Decisiveness 10
Engineering 6
Mechanical Ability 6
Navigation 6
Administration 10
Botanical Knowledge 7
Medicine 5
Surgery 5
Trading 5
Languages 7
Tactics 6
Weapons Combat 8
Hand to Hand Combat 7
Long Distance Running 6
Sprinting speed 6
Physical Strength 7
Hand-Eye Coordination 6

One change I've had to make. "Long Distance Running" is now "Physical Endurance" and encompasses the ability to do any physical activity, running, climbing, whatever for periods of time.

Now that the game board is made the cross country running aspect of the game had to be cut out it just wouldn't work with any design of the game board.

Scratch that, long distance running is back in
I worked out the board issue.

We did a dry run of the game tonight and it worked pretty well. There are some things that are not right completely but it was playable.

In the end John of Gaunt assasinated Colonel Kurtz and led his team to victory.
I can't remember who else was on his team, I know Thomas Edison was, Martin Luther I think.
Richard the Lionheart (who got whacked) and someone else.

Worked pretty well all in all.