There are many kinds of games out there and the wife and I were playing Coloretto the other night before bed.  Nothing really terribly heavy at all.  It's a simple, quick game.  We love it.

It got me to thinking that maybe I should make some lighter games.  I love my brain burners...  Steam (even though some dismiss it, I find it a good mix of feast and famine), Age of Steam (I stink at it), 1960, 18xx....  I'll take damn near anything.  But the wife?  She tries, I'll give her that much, but it doesn't suit her.  I thought "Owner's Choice" might bring something to the table, but I'm not sure if it is going to fly or not.  I've played it on my own and like it enough, but it still might not be her thing.

The games she has said she's liked include "Mr. President" (which is still one of my favorite games), "Ticket To Ride" (which she prefers to play quickly on the computer), Blokus and Mancala.  She is an ex-political science major, so there are a few themes that I would like to work on with this.

So I wandered back to Owner's Choice and wondered if it would be possible to create a similar mechanic with an election game?  I thought about using different tracks and dice for the board, however, I think I'm going to go with cards for at least the board.  The idea is to have 24 or some odd cards with two "squares" on them.  These squares can benefit Democrats, Republicans, Whoever Lands On Them, or they may trigger events, issues or polls.  One player will draw cards and fill two tracks with five cards each.  Once both are filled, the other player picks which track to use.  Each game will go through 4 turns (or 40 tracks).  Each player then takes turn placing markers for "swing" states... any state that does not have a heavy advantage for one party.  Finally, 5 cubes go to each player as political capital and the remaining cubes go in the bag.  A turn pawn is placed right next to the first space on the "board" or row of cards. The remaining cubes (20 or so?) will go in a bag.

The other part of the equation are those event cards (or dice).  An event card will have a party (R/R/D/D/Any/None), a region (NE/SE/SW/NW/MW/any), a state (large/small/swing/winning/losing/any), an issue type (defense/jobs/economy/1/2/any) and yes, a party.  Depending on what card is drawn, other cards may need to be drawn to determine where players may place support cubes.

From there, each player must move the pawn 1, 2 or 3 spaces.  Each square has a different effect, but the general idea is to give the players the following options:

• If a player lands on their own party square, they can try to fundraise 2 cubes out of the bag.  Any matching cube may be kept by the player.  The player may also play one of their political capital cubes that matches three event card draws, first for region, then two for states.  The player can only modify one state at a time one level at a time.  (See below)
• If a player lands on an ISSUE square, a player may pull up to three cubes from a matching issue square and draw three cards, first for region, then two states
• If a player lands on a POLL space they may flip over the next three cards, return them to the deck, and then move again.
• If a player lands on a FUND space, the landing player gains 3 cubes from the bag to store as political capital.  The person who doesn't land on it gets to draw 1 cube.

One other rule...  Say the Dems have two cubes on California.  The Reps would need to match two cubes to remove ONE of the Dem cubes.  From there, they would need another cube to draw it even.  But each state has a built in bias, so California would require yet another cube.  Expending four cubes to switch a state is costly and would require three separate turns to do so.  

Once the pawn moves off the track, the player who is in the lead gets to pick whether they want to draw the next board or pick between the two rows.  If it's the end of the fourth turn, the cubes are tallied and someone wins.

Other ideas involve keeping player hands, but I think I'm going to stay away from this.  I'm also considering just sticking to six basic event types and making the entire game dice driven, although the POLL action would need to be changed.  

It could be a good print and play game.  It has elements of Owner's Choice with a different theme that works well with jockeying for position and the tit for tat that was part of the entire presidential election process.  I think I can make a fairly balanced game out of it electorally and the addition of player-based swing states could add some replay value as well.  There is a fair amount of luck, however, the possibility of drawing up a choice of region or state and two sets of winning/losing/large/small states appeals to me.  The fundraising and spending may need tweaked, but, again, I like the idea of fundraising being abstracted to the point of simply amassing cubes and spending them wisely. 

It still needs work, but it's a good start.  Maybe this weekend I can draft some cards and give it a go.