darkSpyro

Welcome to the Official Unofficial Skylanders Tabletop Game Thread. This is a game meant to be played using your Skylanders and their matching cards. It is mostly meant to be played for fun, but I've ran this idea by the manager of my local EB Games (also a Skylanders fanatic) and he said he would support tournaments in his store if the rules gained enough popularity. Ok, here goes...


Requirements:

- A tape measure
- 8 of your own Skylanders with their cards
- 8 of opponents own Skylanders with their cards
- Both players may also bring to the game Magic Items and Location Pieces (from Adventure Packs) with their corresponding cards.


Your side will consist of 8 Skylanders, one from each element (if players don't own one of each element, then both players may come to an agreement of how many Skylanders to use). Your side may NOT contain more than two Giant Skylanders (as indicated by the Giants symbol on the lower right corner on stat cards), this keeps things fair.


Setup: It is recommended that you play on a large surface (i.e dining table or coffee table). Players sit opposite each other.

Decide who goes first (by flipping a coin, rolling a dice, youngest player etc.). The first player places their first Skylander on the table, then the second player places a Skylander and so on until all Skylanders have been placed. Your skylanders may NOT be placed within 30 inches of an opponent's Skylander. Set aside a space to place your cards so both players can clearly see them. All your cards need to be face up, facing you.


Turns consist of 3 different phases:

1. Magic
2. Movement
3. Attack


1. Magic



2. Movement



3. Attack:



Special Rules:

Luck: Once during yours or your opponents turns, you may add your Skylanders Luck to one of the following values:

Movement (your turn) OR
Attack (your turn) OR
Defense (opponents turn)

Luck may only be used once per Skylander per your turn or opponents turn, so if you use Luck for Movement, it cannot be used for Attack or Defense and vice versa.

Also, at the end of your turn, if you haven't already used your Luck, you may use it to make an additional Movement (using your Luck value instead of Movement value).This will ultimately cancel you from adding your Luck to your Defense during your opponents turn.

Any unused Luck values cannot be carried forth to your next turn.

Element Power: When defending against a Skylander of the same Element, you may subtract 20 from opponent's Attack value.

Critical Hit: If your total Attack Value is more than double opponent's Defence then that Skylander is Criitically Hit. Rotate that Skylander 180° instead of the usual 90°.


The winner is the first to eliminate all of their opponents Skylanders.

Rules version 0.63 Beta revision 210513

Please feel free to PM me for a printable PDF or MS Word version of these rules to play amongst your friends.

Let me know about your own game play using these rules. Feedback will help make a better game experience.

Can we make this a sticky?

Could you maybe integrate having battle items? Like they would be a figure you would move, only it cannot be attacked, and it lasts a certain amount of turns. Each turn it can move 4-5 spaces?

Quote: zookinator

Could you maybe integrate having battle items? Like they would be a figure you would move, only it cannot be attacked, and it lasts a certain amount of turns. Each turn it can move 4-5 spaces?

Could you please elaborate? I'm not really sure what you mean by battle items.

Besides, I'm trying to keep these rules as simplified as possible so people of all ages can play.

Could you integrate Variant rules, like the Silvers, Clears, etc.?

Maybe, add + 10 to all stats?
Well, if you're crazy enough to open them.

Quote: Matteomax

Could you integrate Variant rules, like the Silvers, Clears, etc.?

Maybe, add + 10 to all stats?
Well, if you're crazy enough to open them.

Variants get their own stats as you can see:



otherwise, colour variations are just representations of their normal characters.

You gotta set up a map with spaces of a specified size to accommodate ANY figure (Or you could make Giants bases a value of two or more spaces). I don't think anyone is going to want to sit and measure out movement with a tape measure, etc. each time.

@Sparx_Dragonfly
one great awesome post, i like your ideas of this

@all
anyone got a pic of the s2 sg spyro card with stats?... if anyone have a pic please post it here...

cool idea

Quote: Sparx_Dragonfly

Quote: zookinator

Could you maybe integrate having battle items? Like they would be a figure you would move, only it cannot be attacked, and it lasts a certain amount of turns. Each turn it can move 4-5 spaces?

Could you please elaborate? I'm not really sure what you mean by battle items.

Besides, I'm trying to keep these rules as simplified as possible so people of all ages can play.

Battle items, like the Dragonfire Cannon and the Scorpion Striker? They wheel around and follow you in Giants?

What the hell, you jerk! You stole my idea! You're never going to hear the end of this!!!

...I'm jesting! I'm jesting! I'm actually kind of glad someone took the idea and did something with it.

Are you talking about me?

Its kinda confusing but I like it

Nah, I meant Sparx Dragonfly, but it was a joke.

That is… surprisingly robust. I was expecting something a lot simpler, but this uses all the stats and options the toys/cards have without getting needlessly complex. It’s as least as solid as any ‘beginners’ tabletop game (Heroes Quest, Space Crusade, D&D Board Game).
The one downside is totally out of your control (namely, that the characters were never supposed to be balanced, therefore it’ll be possible to select the ‘best’ possible team).
I’m going to try this with my nephew, but make a few changes.

The most important change: I’m going to add a D8 to the game. When in battle both players roll a D8 and add the total (times ten) to their attack/defence score... so a 3 is 30, and a 7 is 70. That way a badly outmatched pairing still favours the person with the high attack/defence, but there is a little bit of random chance that will allow for a possible upset.

Secondly… Luck. I love what you did with that. Seriously, making it a skill modifier is a stroke of genius.
However, it does put a high-luck character at a significant advantage strategically, as they can excel at any discipline. Scarlett Ninjini would be a monster – she could effortlessly parry any attack and then melt the face of the attacker in the next turn.
To change this I’m allowing each character one ‘free’ use of luck. After that a token is placed on that Skylander’s card. Every subsequent use of luck requires a coin toss to see if it works. All the same rules apply - once a round, etc. It’ll work 50%, fail 50% of the time… after all… you can’t be lucky all the time.

^I like this new take on the luck!

Also, the teams should be composed of any eight characters on a team (with the limitation of two Giants still in place) rather than one of each element. I think some interesting rules could be applied for "team advantages or disadvantages".

And I suggest implementing some sort of range aspect. Such as rolling a die to determine the amount of spaces a Skylander can attack up to.

The range question is tricky, as ideally you do want a mixture of ranged and melee characters in a game like this to lend variety. Unfortunately there really is no fair or balanced way to implement it.
I guess the most balanced way would be to gift ranged attack to characters with a low attack score – for example: Attack < 40, range 7”. Attack < 50, range 4”. Attack more than 60, range base-to-base.

That would actually help balance the weak characters, because it would obviously give a reason to use figures with a low attack, however I don’t think it’s worth the dissidence you’d get from melee figures attacking at range while melee figures have to be base-to-base.

A better idea might be just to say, you can attack at a 10” range at half-power. That’s less balanced, but requires less rules and would be easier to remember.

---

On a totally different topic, my immediate thought was to put in some kind of “water gets bonus against fire” damage mechanic, but that would get complicated REAL quickly. It’s hard as a b**** to balance, and you’d need a chart to keep track of it all.
Now I know there is already an official Elemental bonus chart for PVP, but I don’t like it. Earth better than tech? WTF, why? Drill Sargent is basically a freaken bulldozer, for crying out loud! And boomer literally looks like a crazy miner!
If I was going to do it, I’d try to balance the elements so that some are weak against many, but strong against many others – but others are strong against less, but have few vulnerabilities. For example, Magic doesn’t have any weaknesses, but isn’t strong against anything. I’d also try have it count against DAMAGE rather than Attack/Defence.
But overall, it would add a LOT of rules to the game that would slow it down. I think simplicity and speed need to be the big considerations when adding to the rules.

I initially did include dice in an earlier version of my Rules, but my target audience is people of all ages. I have tested these rules with my 7 year old son, my 15 year old nephew and a friend who is 26 years old.

My son had no idea of how the dice rolls worked. Both my friend and my nephew understood how the dice rolls worked, but my nephew said even with the randomness of dice rolls some Skylanders are still too powerful (i.e Eye Brawl with 150 defense can never be defeated, no matter what the outcome of the dice roll). Dice just make the game plain confusing , and dont even reflect a Skylanders true characteristics.

Thats why I've included such factors as Luck, Locations, Magic Items and the ability to have 2 Skylanders attack the same opponent at once. I know this means a player can team up 2 Giants and possibly knock off their opponent's Skylanders one by one by using their combined Attacks, but with a little planning at strategy the other player can easily overcome this.

The reason why only one of each element is allowed is based to two factors: Element Power and Locations. - A player would be tempted to bring only one Location Piece (let's say Dragon's Peak) and had 8 Fire Element Skylanders, and if the other player didn't bring any Locations then Dragons Peak would be the Location Card drawn every turn, making all Fire Element Skylanders Attack and Defense +20 every single turn of the game, causing it to be an unfair advantage.

The idea of combining Attacks from two different Skylanders, is a way to defeat more powerful characters, hence making gameplay a little more balanced. I got this idea from 2-player co-op and thats how I translated it into gameplay. I am also editing the Sky-Iron Shield to make it work in a similar way to this rule to help out defense.

I've designed this game to be simple enough to be played by people of all ages, so I'm trying to avoid making this game complex. That's why there's no dice, no maps and everything is contained in the cards and the rules. All you really need to bring along are your Skylanders, Cards a set of the rules and a tape measure (I have a mini keyring tape measure which I purchased from a $2 store and is perfect).

Fair call RE: the dice… Although I still think I’ll use them. Perhaps a D10, so that’s an advantage of up to 90 for one roll. That way even the weakest Skylander should have a slim shot.
Slight rule addition, even if ganging up to attack, attackers only roll the one die.

Also think that I’ll include Giant as a separate slot, so teams are 8 Skylanders and 1 Giant.

As it is, I imagine it’ll be a rush to mob the other giant without losing your own, and then picking off survivors.
I’m trying to think what motivation you can give to not just move all your guys as a giant Ball Of Doom to ensure you can attack at maximum strength each time. I do think that the ranged rule could help, as you’d be able to pick off the ones on the edges of the BoD… but… not sure.

Anyhow, congrats again. Dice or no dice, that’s a pretty solid system you’ve cobbled together there. Can’t wait to test it and see how it plays.

2 Giants (4if you count both players) eliminates any need for rush mob tactics... you could rush one giant, but then there's another for backup. My son like to place his Giants either side of his other 6 Skylanders. That way the Giants can hold their own, or move in to defend the little guys.

I think by using a tape measure rather than a map with just square spaces is making it too complex. A simple board with squares will work, translating the 1" into 1 space and so on. Honestly, if I bought a board game where I had to take a tape measure and measure the distance to move every single turn, that game would be returned to the store. A simple map with squares like a checkerboard will make things easier, not more complex. Everyone understands what 4 spaces means.

Quote: czs716

I think by using a tape measure rather than a map with just square spaces is making it too complex. A simple board with squares will work, translating the 1" into 1 space and so on. Honestly, if I bought a board game where I had to take a tape measure and measure the distance to move every single turn, that game would be returned to the store. A simple map with squares like a checkerboard will make things easier, not more complex. Everyone understands what 4 spaces means.

If you can read inches on a tape measure then you can play this game. My 7 year old son can read a tape measure easily. There's also the trouble of obtaining such a huge board/map for such a game. Most household printers only print onto standard paper sizes and it would be a tedious task to draw out an entire map by hand. Another factor that wouldn't work is the fact that Giants have bigger bases, so all squares/tiles (or whatever you want to call them) would need to accomodate all Giants, making them the wrong dimensions for standard Skylanders.

I wanted this game to be able to be taken anywhere and setup easily regardless of the surface you're playing on. You shouldn't need to carry around paper maps which are easily damaged or destroyed.

My tabletop gaming experiences include Warhammer, Warhammer 40K and The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game, so measuring movement using ruler/tape measure is second nature to me. Games have since come along which require a tiled map system and the whole idea feels quite amateur to me.

With problem about Giant's bases, you could just have a Giant occupy two spaces. The board could be a chess board, and I wouldn't mind creating my own so long I wouldn't have to get fiddly with measurements.

Quote: zookinator

With problem about Giant's bases, you could just have a Giant occupy two spaces. The board could be a chess board, and I wouldn't mind creating my own so long I wouldn't have to get fiddly with measurements.

Chess Board? way too few squares for this type of game! Maybe you should try playing with a tape measure and then you will realise how truly beneficial it is.

I have. and it is a little tricky moving around the figures. When I say a chess board, maybe someone could create a 46'' by 10'' board like one?

This game really does seem like alot of fun to play. But I agree with everyone else. We need a game board.

Okay people, here’s the deal: the game board for this game would have to be as big as the entire darn table! It’s just massively impractical.
Most tabletop war-games (and this is a tabletop war-game) use a tape measure – Warhammer, 40k, D&D, etc. If you’re not used to it, it might sound complicated. But I assure you that after a game or two you’ll find it pretty natural… hell, after a dozen games you’ll probably be comfortable eye-balling half the moves.

Re: Number of Giants.
I think that that there is room for different formats – In fact, you sort of need them. “Massive punch-up in the middle” mode will only entertain you so long. I’ll definitely try the ‘vanilla’ rules first (2 giants, 8 figures total), but the idea of eight ‘normal’ figures and one giant that is ‘King’ is really interesting to me. Uber-powerful, but auto-fail if you lose it. A ‘Capture the King’ mode, if you will.

The other ‘game mode’ that appeals to me is stolen from Warhammer.
Divide the table into quarters and play for ten rounds.
At the end of the tenth round, count how many figures you have in each quarter. The person with the most figures in that quarter wins the quarter, the one with the most quarters wins the game.
Lots of strategy trying to figure out which quarters you think you can hold, and which you think you can take.

Annnnnnnnnnd returning to the dice. I’m still sold on dice (and the heads-tales luck mechanic) to add a little entropy to the proceedings. What you really want is a D100 – but those are… not user friendly. I totally get how a five-year old might not get it, but (like yu-gi-oh and such) there is a place for ‘standard rules’ and ‘advanced rules’.
However, the more I think about it, the dice rule and the ranged attack rule are too complicated together, and I really want the option for ranged attacks!
Other than “half damage for a 10-inch attack”, does anyone else have any good ideas on how to add ranged attacks into the game?

I have been testing these rules since they first appeared on a different thread and I haven't really thought it right to comment until I had played a few games so I would have a 'real' perspective on these rules.

I am +1 for no gameboard! I was all for it to begin with, but after biting the bullet and taking out a ruler, sorry couldnt get my hands on a tape measure (but I will be getting one of those mini keyrings as Sparx suggested!) I felt a whole sense of freedom with my Skylanders and no restrictions to the edge of a board or map or whatever you wanna call it! With a board (and somebody suggestef 46" x 10") you would only have the ability to movr forwards, not left or right as the area would be too compact!

As for rangef attacks, I have decided to make half of the elements (and I know thete will be debates, sorry, I can't keep everyone happy...) ranged attackers.

Ranged attackers: Life, Magic, Fire and Tech


Ranged Attackers may attack an opponent if within 12 inches. This attack may not be combined with any other Skylander.

Another idea I have been toying with is a Deploy Phase (first phase of every turn).

During game setup, instead of placing all your Skylanders on table one by one, keep your 8 Skylanders Cards in your hand. During your Deploy Phase, you may place ONE Skylander Card in front of you and place the matching Skylander on table, remembering not to place your Skylander within 30 inches of an opponents Skylander... this mixes things up a little bit requiring both players to have taken at least 8 turns before all Skylanders are on the table. This creates more possibilities with such a simple set of rules.

Wait, I may have been using the tape measure wrong, as in I just kept it on the table. Should it stay on the table or not, as I have never played a game involving a tape measure (until now).

Quote: zookinator

Wait, I may have been using the tape measure wrong, as in I just kept it on the table. Should it stay on the table or not, as I have never played a game involving a tape measure (until now).

Take your tape measure, touch it to the base of your Skylander, then in the direction you want to move it, take your tape measure out until it reaches your Skylanders maximum movement. where the tape measure stops, that is where your skylander moves.

Not sure if that was the best explaination, but if someone can come up with a better one, plrase do...

I have added an addition of Ranged Attack to the Attack rules as well as some minor tweaks.

I figured all Skylanders have their own ranged attack in some form or another so why not incorporate this into the Tabletop Game.

What about for the ranged attack you have to flip a coin to determine a hit or miss. I mean having all skylanders able to attack up to 12" just changes the attack rule from 4" to 12" if there aren't any special requirements or limitations, aside from double attacks and Ghost Swords, which should stay in place even with the coin flip.

"If your Skylander is within 12 inches of an opponents Skylander, it may make a Ranged Attack. A Ranged Attack works exactly like a normal Attack except you use Agility (Movement) value instead of Attack value and you may not combine attacks."

Nice.
I'll be trying these out really soon.

Quote: Sparx_Dragonfly

Quote: Matteomax

Could you integrate Variant rules, like the Silvers, Clears, etc.?

Maybe, add + 10 to all stats?
Well, if you're crazy enough to open them.

Variants get their own stats as you can see:



otherwise, colour variations are just representations of their normal characters.

I don't think those variants are what he had in mind. I think he means un-named variants such as Flocked Stump Smash, Rock Textured Zook, Gold Flameslinger, Toy Fair Chop Chop, Employee Prism Break, or etc. I've never actually come across these chase variants myself, but I assume that the cards that come with them are the same as normally painted figures. Hence the statement of being crazy enough to open collector items like those.

---------

Edit: My bad, this post was entirely pointless. I just noticed the "otherwise" section under the picture. Sorry for wasting your time there... However I do think that having the chase/rare variants having some sort of special bonus would be nice. Having such a hard time or even dumb luck to get them outta be worth something more than just completing your collection to yet another extreme. (Personally I don't go for chase/rare variants like that. I love getting the legendaries, reposes, and uniquely named ones though!) I say let them have a stat bonus! Also, did you have any plans for the sidekicks or the volcanic vault? (I'm sorry if I missed it and you already answered this.) You know, since they lack cards that go with them.

I like this a lot. As for the game board issue, I thought I'd throw out what I used to do for the Star Wars and WoW miniatures games. There's square and hex grid sheets all over the internet that people have custom made, both with and without artwork/terrain/etc printed on them. I used to print them out on 8-1/2 x 11 sheets of paper and then tape them together on the back side. Then take them to Kinko's and have them use their big laminator. The process made it all one big slick board that wouldn't get hurt by spills and concealed the tape on the back. It ended up being 2 feet by 3 or 4 feet and usually cost less than 10 bucks. The best part is that you could roll it up like a poster when not using it and save on storage space.

I'll look and see if I can find one of the old printouts as an example.

-Grishnaar

Here we go:

http://starwarsmaps.blogspot.com/

You can buy the full prints from his cafepress store or print out in various formats and take to Kinko's for laminating. Obviously just an example but some could be used for this setting and there's obviously tons of other custom stuff like this all over the net.

-Grishnaar

Great idea. Hope tournaments eventually happen.

You know, I thought of how to use the Dragonfire Cannon and Scorpion Striker.

The Dragonfire cannon follows a Skylander for 3 turns, and will help a Skylander in melee by adding 20 points to the attack stat.
The Scorpion Striker will follow a Skylander for 3 turns, and will help a Skylander by adding on 20 points to the agility stat for ranged attacks only.

Hmm, the sidekicks would be interesting. Perhaps, something along the lines of: A single sidekick may be placed on one of your skylanders during your magic phase. When sidekicks are attached, add "xx" to your defense. Sidekicks remain in play until the attached skylander is attacked.

Each player may only bring one of each type of sidekick. Sidekicks remain on your side of the playing area until used and are removed from the game after they have been played.

Not sure what the defense value should be. And since they don't have cards, just removing them after they have been used seems like the best way to handle that.

Any other ideas for the sidekicks?


Also, for the volcanic vault, perhaps it could be used to negate the location pieces and subtract 20 from the appropriate elements. So it would be a gamble to use since it affected you as well.

I'm disappointed in myself about how interesting I'm finding this thread, LOL!

I do want to point out/pile on that using a tape measure would be too distracting, finicky, take you out of the game. Regular paper role playing games usually use a hex field and count each hex as 5 feet or 10 feet or whatever. Also I think the hexes would usually be an awesome size for Skylander bases. Simplify things by omitting the tape measure and replacing it with hexes. I'm not sure what would make sense, you quoted Spyro as having a move of 9 inches, if you made that 9 hexes you would need a MASSIVE sheet to not run out of room quickly (I feel like 9 actual inches would have this same issue, FYI). Maybe each hex is 4 inches, then round down? (so Spyro could move 2 hexes).

Maybe find out the minimum, the lowest-Agility Skylander, and make his Move value the distance for 1 hex.

The minimum is Prism Break, with 10 agility.

...Which by these rules means a movement of 1 inch, which by my suggestion means 1 inch = 1 hex, means Spyro would STILL be moving 9 hexes. D'oh! LOL!

Quote: niceguy1I'm not sure what would make sense, you quoted Spyro as having a move of 9 inches, if you made that 9 hexes you would need a MASSIVE sheet to not run out of room quickly[/quote

Which is why the idea was for a whole table top and a tape measure.

[quote=niceguy1 (I feel like 9 actual inches would have this same issue, FYI).

Nope - most Warhammer 40k figures have a movement of 6" or a running movement of 12".

Ok, just want to know if anyone has had a chance to play a game using these rules yet? What are your impressions?

I have, and it takes a long time with the same gameplay. So, it just get's quite boring. Speaking of play testing, I just recently held a tournament with my card game rules, and everyone enjoyed it. The reward was a Trigger Snappy, and 8 people were in. The game was easy to pick up, it was just hard to master. Everyone enjoyed the "sudden deaths" I made up.