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Ark Nova Design Teardown #2: Scoring
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On today's episode of the Ark Nova design teardown, Isaac breaks down the game's scoring system. He goes through the different types of points, how the game handles each one, and how they managed the transition from the physical prints of Ark Nova to the digital port. What works about the game's scoring system? What doesn't? Tune in to find out.
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Transcript
Welcome and Introduction
00:00:16
Speaker
Hello again. This is Isaac Shalev, and I'm happy to welcome you back to the Arc Nova Design Teardown.
Arc Nova's Unique Victory Points System
00:00:24
Speaker
In design communities, you'll often hear that your scoring system is your game.
00:00:29
Speaker
So today, we're going to talk about Arc Nova's approach to victory points. A quick breakdown of how points work in Arc Nova, and you know I'm not going to go through all the rules. But let's try and establish a common framework. So as with most victory point games, the player with the most points at the end of the game wins.
00:00:47
Speaker
But ARK doesn't have a fixed number of rounds, and the endgame is not triggered by achieving some specific goal, like filling your map or emptying your hand of cards or building a capstone building or project of some kind.
00:01:01
Speaker
Instead, the endgame is triggered when a player scores 114 points. This point total may sound a little odd, but we're going to circle back to it. So hang on, especially if you've only played the first printing of ARK Nova and if you've only played in physical format.
00:01:17
Speaker
Ark Nova's points come in three different varieties. There are appeal, conservation points, and endgame points. The most common way to score is to gain appeal. Every animal you play provides some appeal value, and so do some sponsors.
00:01:32
Speaker
Filling your map is also a worth seven appeal. Appeal works similarly to the way that victory points do in, say, Terraforming Mars. It's both points towards winning the game, but it also increases your money income.
00:01:46
Speaker
In Terraforming Mars, the relationship is one-to-one. Whenever you gain a victory point, your income is increased by one in the next generation as well. If you have 28 victory points, you'll get 28 money.
00:01:58
Speaker
In ARCNOVA, the rate of income increases in a nonlinear fashion.
Appeal and Conservation Points Explained
00:02:02
Speaker
The first five appeal provide a one-to-one increase, and then the next 12 give one income per every two appeal. The next 12 give one per three appeal, et cetera.
00:02:12
Speaker
Conservation points, on the other hand, are earned most often by backing conservation projects, though there are a few other ways that you can get conservation points in ARCNOVA, like getting a bonus for a third university or a fourth zoo or a fourth worker.
00:02:28
Speaker
Conservation points, or CPs, provide progress towards triggering game end, but they don't affect your income. And the way that ArcNova visually represents this is by having two tracks.
00:02:41
Speaker
right Because if you think about it, appeal and conservation points are essentially the same, except that appeal also has this income effect that we need to track separately. So we've got these two tracks, and appeal is tracked ah on a track that moves from right to left, and the conservation point one starts at the opposite end and moves from left to right.
00:03:06
Speaker
The way that these tracks are constructed is that the end game is going to trigger when a player's conservation points marker crosses their appeal marker.
00:03:16
Speaker
The conservation track is laid over the appeal track so that each conservation space covers several appeal spaces. So functionally speaking, you get that two to one or three to one ratio of conservation to appeal. In other words, a conservation point is typically worth three appeal.
00:03:35
Speaker
Now, I promise you that this system is visually intuitive. Describing it makes it seem maybe more complex than it is, but it really is just two markers that are going from opposite ends, and they're going to meet in the middle.
Final Scoring Complexity
00:03:50
Speaker
One takes lots of little steps, and one takes somewhat larger jumps. But that's really all that's happening.
00:03:56
Speaker
And this is pretty visually intuitive. But the way that the rules instructed players to calculate the final score is a bit convoluted and difficult to follow. And it's it's very much the result of these two tracks moving in opposite directions. And you know you gain in in in visual comprehensive comprehensibility, in visual make-sensitude. it it it looks fine visually, but actually figuring out your score is not as easy. Here's here's a quote from the rulebook just to fully illustrate this.
00:04:31
Speaker
Finally, it's time to tally victory points. Begin by looking at the scoring area where your conservation tracker is located. Find the lowest appeal value in that scoring area.
00:04:43
Speaker
This is your target number. Compare your target number to the value of your appeal tracker. Subtract your target number from the value of your appeal value, and the result is your victory points.
00:04:54
Speaker
The player with the highest positive victory point total is the winner. Clear? Crystal. And as a special feel-good bonus, you'll find that any player whose appeal and conservation markers did not cross, that player would wind up with a negative score.
00:05:14
Speaker
Well, it may seem trivial. I mean, numbers are numbers and you can move them up and down and why does this matter so much?
Digital Adaptation on Board Game Arena
00:05:21
Speaker
But I think this was actually a huge mistake for new players.
00:05:26
Speaker
Even those relatively experienced with complex games, it was pretty common to end the game with only a couple of points or worse, with negative points. After investing in what is a pretty long game to teach and another three hours of gameplay, it was pretty frustrating to be left with a negative score.
00:05:46
Speaker
When the game got ported over to Board Game Arena on a digital format, this issue had to be addressed. On Board Game Arena, most games show a running total of victory points, and BGA is very insistent that digital ports mirror the physical game as much as possible. And so if a game has visible victory points in its tabletop version, they really want you to have the digital game to work the same way.
00:06:15
Speaker
Nor, I don't think anyone was trying to hide them either, but the question is when you've got these two tracks running in these two directions, wow how do you show that running total of of real victory points?
00:06:30
Speaker
And the reality is that for a lot of games, the benefit or one of the benefits that you get from moving into a digital domain is that you often don't have to show the scoreboard or the tracker, even if the physical game has one, because you could just show a running total.
00:06:47
Speaker
And that can save valuable screen real estate, especially for a big game like Ark Nova. But for ARK, showing the score would mean showing negative numbers throughout the game, which is both demoralizing and also not so clear. Negative 78 versus negative 54. Who's ahead?
00:07:05
Speaker
It's the smaller number, right? The 54. But that doesn't sound right. It doesn't feel right. and You know, it's a little bit of friction, a little bit confusing. So functionally, the solution was really straightforward, which is just to dispense with this subtracting the conservation value from the appeal and instead to just sum them together.
00:07:26
Speaker
The game had been designed so that appeal and conservation always crossed when their sum was 100. So that's actually kind of neat because now you've got this race to 100. The only odd sort of leftover bit is that at the start of a game, a player's current score was actually negative 14.
00:07:46
Speaker
So, okay, overall, it's not such a big deal. Players pretty much cross into into positive points in the first or second round. So it's kind of just an oddity. But... the superiority of the system of racing to 100, even though you start from minus 14, was clear and obvious. And actually follow-up printings of Ark Nova for the physical board game use that new scoring model, which is great. And it's the kind of thing that you really hope...
00:08:13
Speaker
would be addressed in development, that would be seen in playtesting and that you'd come up with a solution for instead of this kind of backporting it. But nevertheless, kudos to them. They recognize the issue. They came up with a solution that is much more functional, and that's terrific.
00:08:30
Speaker
And I think that, you know, ultimately these are two identical mathematical systems, but it's a really important bit of design advice. The mechanics of scorekeeping and the scores themselves contribute a lot to how players experience the game.
00:08:46
Speaker
So just as you would address a fiddly resource acquisition mechanism, you ought to address and simplify a fiddly scoring mechanism. Okay.
Strategic Importance of Endgame Points
00:08:56
Speaker
Let's get back to how points work.
00:08:58
Speaker
We talked about appeal, which, remember, provides progress towards triggering game end and also provides an income boost. We also talked about conservation points, CPs, sometimes shields because they look like little green shields. and they're worth more appeal, and they trigger the endgame. They contribute towards that total that you need to get to, that 100. But they don't ah increase your income.
00:09:25
Speaker
instead The conservation points do offer milestone rewards at 2 CP, 5 CP, and 8 CP levels. And at 10 CP, they cause both players to discard at one of the two endgame scoring cards, which we'll get to in just a moment.
00:09:43
Speaker
Now, these milestone rewards are hugely important. They're an incredibly important aspect of Ark Nova's strategy and the strategic considerations relating to them totally dominate the early and middle game. So we're going to cover the battles over these milestones in a separate epi episode.
00:09:59
Speaker
For now, let's just say that Ark Nova is not just a race to 100 points. It's actually several races that are braided together. And there are trade-offs and balancing acts and rippling implications of each race against the other.
00:10:12
Speaker
So I hope you'll stick around to hear more about them in that future episode. But let's get back to our point and the last category of victory points, which is end games. Now, Anyone playing Ark Nova, I hope you're all familiar with it, you might be scratching your head a little because end games are just CPs for the most part. Sometimes they're appeal, but they're they're all just CPs. And you're right in terms of denomination. The end games are points that are awarded in the form of some um some number of appeal or some number of of CPs. But they are functionally different.
00:10:49
Speaker
And that's why I've put them into their own category. Each player starts with a secret endgame card, and that gives them the opportunity to score up to four additional CP by achieving some condition.
00:11:02
Speaker
Maybe it's playing a lot of sponsor cards or having a high reputation or playing a lot of animals who require a specific habitat like water or rock. There are also some sponsor cards that can be played during the game that offer endgame rewards, CPs, and appeal for certain achievements.
00:11:21
Speaker
For example, having all the continents present in your zoo. Endgame points don't provide income like Appeal does, and they don't trigger milestone rewards like CPs.
00:11:32
Speaker
So they're strictly worse, right? Well, not exactly. See, like we said earlier, ARC is not strictly a raise to 100 points. Breaking 100 triggers the endgame, but after one player passes that 100-point mark, every other player gets another turn.
00:11:50
Speaker
In arc, what this means in practice is that players may not actually have an equal number of turns. As the game starts winding down, players have to consider whether they want to cause the game to end and then give their opponent that extra turn, or whether they prefer to delay crossing the 100-point line by making some alternative play.
00:12:11
Speaker
Here's an example. Imagine your opponent has 99 points and you've got 90. On your turn, you can choose between a 10-point move or a 1-point move.
00:12:24
Speaker
Which should you choose? You might think you should choose the 10-point move. It's worth more points, right? But if you play the 10-point move, you'll trigger the endgame. Your opponent will then play their best remaining move, and the game will end with your 1-point move left unplayed.
00:12:45
Speaker
On the other hand, if you play your 1-point move, If your opponent makes any move that gains them an appeal or conservation point, then they'll cross and they'll give you that one last turn. You'll play your 10-point move, and so you'll net 11 total points.
00:13:03
Speaker
Now, this is a very simplified example. You might think, okay, one point, big deal, but you might easily have 22-point move against an eight-point move. And now you're thinking, do I get 98 or do I...
00:13:17
Speaker
Go all the way over to 112. So you've really got to think these things through. You also have to remember that your opponent might be able to make some kind of delaying move and can play a card that doesn't give them award you know points right away, but gives them points at endgame.
00:13:34
Speaker
In other words, they can essentially get free points without triggering the endgame and giving you that extra turn. because those points will only be rewarded after the game is concluded.
00:13:46
Speaker
So it's true that your opponent might've put themselves in a bit of a bad situation by hitting 99 points, right? Because they've kind of handcuffed themselves. So why would they have done such a thing?
00:13:59
Speaker
Probably not just bad calculation, not if they're a good player. Instead, they're exploiting another aspect of the more than just a race nature of Ark Nova.
00:14:11
Speaker
Particularly later in the game, when players have more money, and they've sifted the deck for better animals and cards to get into their hands, they likely qualify for more conservation projects.
00:14:23
Speaker
In that environment, a single move can generate a lot of points. By hitting 99 and saving a strong move with which to cross, our opponent is playing for the overkill, for the overdrive.
00:14:36
Speaker
Rather than racing to trigger the endgame by the skin of their teeth and hoping we won't be able to catch up, they're using the extra time to sidle right up to the finish line, and then in their last turn, they'll put in a huge play and blast way past 100.
00:14:53
Speaker
Ark Nova endgames can be really tense and dynamic and skill testing because of these different opportunities and because of the different kinds of points and ways to score them that the games provide.
00:15:06
Speaker
Players have to remember which cards their opponents have previously taken so that they can predict what their opponents might be able to do. They have to account for all the playable cards in the display because frequently players can play directly out of the display later in the game.
00:15:21
Speaker
And they also have to play the odds on which cards might come out of the deck. And all of this you've got to do on top of calculating all the ways a given play can trigger point scoring, both for yourself and your own tableau and your opponent's tableau.
00:15:37
Speaker
A close game can easily swing based on endgame play, and a strong combo on a last turn can score 30 or 40 or even 50 points, so no lead is truly safe.
00:15:48
Speaker
Arc novices might not notice the implication of the interplay between endgame and in-game points, and they might not see much beyond the sort of standard Euro trope of having each player play an equal number of turns in this mechanism that the player who crosses gives the other players one more turn each.
Key Design Lessons from Arc Nova
00:16:07
Speaker
But top players are absolutely strategizing for the endgame, and they're doing it when they're still a good 60 or 70 points away, and they're positioning themselves to finish with a sequence of moves that are efficient and high-scoring and that really generate a lot of pressure on their opponents.
00:16:32
Speaker
OK, let's sum up some design lessons as we get to the end of this episode and give us an opportunity to reflect on how points work in Arc Nova. So victory points can be coupled with income generation and with milestone bonuses.
00:16:48
Speaker
Both will help stoke player engines. They give you more, whether it's money or some other kind of bonus. And what that does is it turns victory points from something that's stale, that's static, that's just a measure of who's winning,
00:17:03
Speaker
into a lever within the machine that players get to build and operate during the game. Whether you decide to lean into appeal to increase income or whether you privilege chasing conservation points to get the milestone bonuses is a huge issue within the game. And in thinking about design and in designing your own games,
00:17:24
Speaker
recognizing that there's some opportunity to turn victory points into something that's not just telling us who's going to win, but actually drives the game forward in some way. It's a really powerful thing to be able to do.
00:17:37
Speaker
Okay, lesson two. Games are not just races or contests. They can be both. So in Ark Nova, whether an equal number of turns are taken or not is ah varies. It varies in different games based on who causes more breaks and who causes the endgame, but ultimately this hyper approach creates depth and dimensionality. And the best thing about it is that it has so little downside impact on how easy the game is to learn and play for beginners.
00:18:11
Speaker
So the idea that whoever causes the break ah is second in the following round, that's pretty straightforward, right? That's not confusing at all, is again a common trope. And the idea that Whoever reaches the final score, whoever causes the end game, whoever does whatever condition it is, gets has to now give everyone else one more turn. These are, again, really common concepts that are out there.
00:18:37
Speaker
And so it's pretty straightforward for new players. But they do create this interesting texture. They create some more opportunities for higher level play.
00:18:48
Speaker
Okay, lesson three. After a long, high effort game, players really like to admire what they've built and to celebrate their score even if they've lost.
00:19:00
Speaker
So don't let players end with negative points. Not for this kind of game. They're not going to forget and they're not going to forgive.
00:19:09
Speaker
Lastly, lesson four. In an efficiency game, the number of actions that you get to take are a valuable type of currency. So as a designer, consider how you let players use tempo to enrich their strategic options.
00:19:24
Speaker
That's going to do it for today. So if you like this episode, please tell a friend or a foe. We're not hung up on your personal vendettas. And tell them that they can subscribe over at wegotplayed.games.
Conclusion and Feedback Invitation
00:19:36
Speaker
If you've got any lessons that you've learned from the victory points in Ark Nova, please share them, and we might read them out on the air. Join me again next time when we talk about tempo and turn order. Thanks for listening.
00:19:48
Speaker
I'm Isaac Shalev, and you can play Ark Nova with me at Board Game Arena by inviting Kind Fortress to your table. Until next time, don't forget to feed your monkeys.
00:20:07
Speaker
Do you have any questions or comments about this episode? Do you know something that we didn't say or know that something we said is false? Do you have a fun fact that you desperately want to share but can't find a way to bring it up in conversation naturally?
00:20:24
Speaker
Send it to us at feedback at wegotplayed.games. That's feedback at wegotplayed.games. Thank you for listening.