Welcome!
Welcome to Ludology, an analytical discussion of the hows and whys of the world of board games. Rather than news and reviews, Ludology explores a variety of topics about games from a wider lens, as well as discuss game history, game design and game players.
We post a new Ludology episode every other week. In these episodes, hosts Erica Bouyouris and Sen-Foong Lim deep-dive into a single topic within game design, often with a well-regarded guest from the game industry. We generally focus on tabletop game design (mainly board games and RPGs), but we often pull in experts from all forms of games, from video games to escape rooms to slot machines.
On weeks where there is no flagship Ludology episode, we will alternate between two smaller mini-sodes. Erica and Sen are happy to announce that Sarah Shipp of Shippboard Games and Stephanie Campbell of TTRPGKids will be joining us for the next year, providing additional content between our longer episodes.
Sarah's segment, Thinking Beyond Mechanisms, is a monthly feature that dives deeper into the other aspects of games beyond the dice and cards we're all familiar with.
Stephanie's segment, TTRPGKids, explores how parents and teachers can use role playing games with children in the home and in the classroom.
We hope you enjoy the additional content!
Our History
We aim for most Ludology episodes to be timeless, so you are welcome to explore our entire catalog. Most of it should age quite well. The podcast was started in 2011 by Geoff Engelstein and Ryan Sturm, with Mike Fitzgerald taking over for Ryan in 2015. Gil and Scott joined the show in 2017 when Mike stepped aside, and Emma joined in 2019 when Geoff ended his tenure as host. Emma left in 2021, and Erica and Sen joined us. Since then, Scott stepped down in 2022 and Gil will be hanging up his mic in 2023, leaving Erica and Sen to carry on this amazing legacy.
Erica and Sen are working to bring new voices to Ludology and have some great things to announce as gaming expands to include even more people!
Contact Us
Have your own thoughts about our topics? We encourage you to visit us at our guild on Boardgamegeek to get involved in a continuing discussion.
You can also email us at hello@ludology.net.
Ludology is part of The Dice Tower Network, the premier board game media network.
If you have questions that you'd like answered on Ludology, let us know by filling out this Google Form; you can also leave an audio question that we can use on the show, if you wish!
Burning Questions for Ludology
Support the Show
Ludology is made possible through the support and donations of listeners like you.
We currently have 3 "First Listen" series that will go out to Patrons well in advance of the audio being released to the wider audience.
- The Memories that Made Us (monthly) - memories about gaming experiences that helped shape the people that bring modern games to life
- Tales from the Designer Toolbox (monthly) - tips and tricks from industry pros learned from both success and failure
- Ludology Live - recordings from conventions around the world
Patrons will also get extra consideration for any giveaways that we might have!
You can also make a one-time or monthly donation here. The link will take you to Erica's account. People who donate in this way will not have access to the Patreon page - sorry!
Jul 11, 2021
Erica, Gil, Scott, and Sen have a roundtable discussion about player counts. We go through each of the common player counts, as well as a few uncommon counts, and discuss what's special about designing for them.
SHOW NOTES
0m39s: Our thoughts about and general strategies for designing games at different player counts.
5m42s: 2-player games
9m20s: We chatted with Matt Wolfe about decision scales on Ludology 157 - Come Scale Away.
13m08s: Inhuman Conditions
13m59s: Belfort
16m24s: Alien: Fate of the Nostromo
19m41s: Pandemic
24m20s: Scott Pilgrim Miniatures the World
24m38s: 3p games
26m44s: The three-body problem.
27m38s: Here's Cole Wehrle's talk on kingmaking in games, and how it can be a good thing.
28m16s: Churchill
28m37s: Basari, which was adapted into Edel, Stein, and Reich in 2003 and modified to try to better handle a higher player count. Also, a note on ties with 3-players: it's impossible to tie on a vote with 3 voters (or any number of odd voters), as long as you are limited to two choices to vote for. Once you have at least 3 choices to vote for, the possibility space gets far more complicated (see the three-body problem above).
30m52s: Rayguns & Rocketships
32m25s: 9-5-2 is known by various names. Here are the rules to Sergeant Major, which is a very similar game; rule changes for 9-5-2 are further down the page.
Also: Carolus Magnus, Bargain Hunter, End of the Triumvirate (Gil was wrong, it can play 2 players), Three Kingdoms Redux
32m58s: 4p games
38m24s: Stuffed Fables, Between Two Cities
39m14s: Tichu
40m03s: 5p games.
Also, a note: Eagle-eared listeners will notice that you don't hear much from Scott from now until the end of the episode. He had to leave our recording session early, so we quickly recorded his bits for the end of the episode. And that's how the sausage gets made!
41m10s: 7 Wonders
44m16s: Alhambra, Alhambra: The Vizier's Favor, Catan: 5-6 Player Extension
47m36s: 6p games
50m44s: Godfather: A New Don. The "other Godfather game" Sen is hinting at is The Godfather: Corleone's Empire by friend of the show Eric Lang.
54m43s: Floor Plan, Welcome To..., Take It Easy, Time's Up, Karuba
56m11s: Werewolf, Two Rooms and a Boom
57m11s: The Unlock! series of games, Cranium
1h00m59s: Terra Mystica
1h01m23s: Arkham Horror
1h02m02s: 1p games. If you want to know more about designing solo versions of games, check out Ludology 154 - Leave Me Alone! (with Morten Monrad Pedersen), Ludology 234 - Playing With Time (with Dávid Turczi), and Ludology 248 - Solo-liloquy (with Carla Kopp).
1h05m12s: Onirim
1h06m38s: Chainsaw Warrior. Sen also mentions Ian Livingstone, who created the Fighting Fantasy series of interactive books with Steve Jackson (that is, the British Steve Jackson who co-founded Games Workshop, not the American Steve Jackson who designed Ogre, GURPS, Illuminati, and Munchkin. To muddy the picture further, the latter Steve Jackson authored three Fighting Fantasy books himself!).
1h07m33s: Kingdom Rush: Rift in Time
1h10m03s: 0p games, starting with So, You've Been Eaten. (Note that the BGG header only shows it as a 1-2 player game; technical limitations prevent it from properly showing as a 0-2 player game.)
1h11m34s: Strat-o-matic Baseball
1h13m30s: In Ludology 142 - Slots of Fun, Geoff and Mike chatted with slot machine designer Jeremy Hornik.
1h15m19s: Another link to Alien: Fate of the Nostromo.
1h15m43s: Sen's project: Avatar: Last Airbender RPG, Tiny Frontiers: Mecha and Monsters (referred to as "Mechs vs. Kaiju"), Coded Chronicles (Jay and Sen have already designed games with the Scooby Doo and The Shining licenses for this series), Dungeon & Dragons: Rock Paper Wizard
1h16m34s: Erica's projects: Rat Queens: To the Slaughter, Disney Sidekicks
1h17m37s: Gil's projects: Networks Broken Token insert, shipping issues, con season coming up