Afd Trading Game Testing Comments, Clarifications:
   
   
Pre Game Testing Comments From EP:
   
   I have a rule listing dated 12/10/98 I'm not sure its the latest one, but
   I've read through it and want to point out some possible game balance
   problems. 
   
   Lets say you have a 3 player game.  Each of the players shoot for 1 of the
   three goals. (ie. one player tries to win the game by only collecting the
   food points, next player is going after sparkles, etc...)  I went through
   all the cards and added up the positive and negative effects for each of
   the categories: food, sparkles, notoriety.
   
   Food: 
   Negative Effecting Cards: 7
   Cards: 01, 04, 06, 13, 18, 27, 38, 
   Positive Effecting Cards: 3
   Cards: 11, 25, 43, 
   
   Sparkles:
   Negative Effecting Cards: 7
   Cards: 23, 24, 27, 33, 34, 35, 44, 
   Positive Effecting Cards: 4
   Cards:  09, 39, 41, 47, 
   
   Notoriety:
   Negative Effecting Cards: 2
   Cards: 14, 21
   Positive Effecting Cards: 9
   Cards: 07, 12, 15, 16, 19, 21, 44, 51, 52
   
   On average anyone shooting for the goal of Notoriety will have the
   advantage in the game. The cards are in their favor. My prediction would
   be that the person shooting for Notoriety would win the game. My clan,
   with their given history of a coming drought would be shooting for the
   food goal would not probably win the game, though they are pretty well
   balanced with the sparkles goal. 
   
   Reading through the rules I see no real advantage to having high point
   dragons. Though there is a great advantage to having nine 1 point dragons.
   When bidding you can use as many as your dragon as you want anyway.  So
   what does it matter if one player bids with 2pt dragon and a 3pt dragon
   and the other player bids with six 1pt dragons. What is the advantage to
   having a high point dragon card? A player is more diversified with a bunch
   of low point cards. I take that back, I see the advantage if you are
   shooting for a lair win, fewer dragon lairs to buy,  however that seems to
   be the only advantage. 
   
   There are twelve cards that can disable a clan's dragon card and even
   remove them from the game. The card to be disabled if it is the "attacker"
   choice will be the highest point dragon card of the opponent. So it would
   be to the advantage to everyone to have nine 1pt dragons.  (even those
   going for lairs)
   
   This brings up another point, which will help a little, the term "A
   nominated Dragon"  this term needs to be defined. Does it mean the
   attacker; (player of the card) gets to choose which dragon is effected? Or
   dies it mean that the opponent; (poor smuck who the card is played on) get
   to make the choice? It may be more balanced if its the latter rather then
   the former. Though you could still have a few cards where the attacker
   gets to make the choice. 
   
   Cards: 02, 06, 08, 10, 22, 24, 27, 37, 40, 45, 49, 52
   
   
   General card addition suggestions:
   
   More cards that directly modify bids.  (adds to or subtracts from skill
   points being bid, just for that turn.) Example:
      
   Honey Bees: adds two skill points for bidding on food just for this turn,
   then it must be discarded.
   
   Practical Joke:  Cancels 3 points of an opponent who is bidding on
   Notoriety this turn, then it must be discarded.
   
   More defensive cards, cards that can cancel some effects of cards being
   played on you. 
   
   Other Cards:
   
   Drunken Gather: All the dragons meet for a dragon gather,  one random
   dragon from each clan gets get into a drinking contest, gets drunk and
   ends up going home to another players clan. (all players randomly swap one
   dragon card with another clan)
   
   Forced Alliance: One clan is forced to help you reach your bidding goal
   for this turn. Half of their total skill points become yours for the turn.
   In Exchange you give them 3000 sparkles, 150 food or 3 points of Notoriety
   from  your store house.
   
   Wheel & Deal: Your highest point dragon is on a roll and is worth double
   its value in the bidding this turn.
   
   The Challenge:  After another clan has won a bidding contest you challenge
   them to a tail wrestling contest if they refuse the challenge they loose
   5 notoriety points. If they accept the challenge the two clans involved send
   in their amazing tail wrestling move that they hope to win with and a vote
   of either rock, paper or scissors to the moderator to see who actually wins.
   If the challenging clan wins they get to have the winnings of the bid. If
   they loose nothing else happens and the challenge is satisfied.
   
   Specific card suggestions:
   Card: 14
   "All clans attempts at..." remove "other" 
   
   Card: 24 
   Give them some reward for answering the riddle. 5,00 food reward.  
   
   
   
Answers From Wyrm:
   
   Firstly, it is completely random as to which clans get which cards.
   Now many of these c   ards can be used to stop an opponent as well as
   improve ones own chances. Many of the N   otoriety ones only increase
   ones chances for the turn of winning the category, and if you a   re
   going for Notoriety an opponent can use these to win themselves and
   deprive you of the p   oints. We'll see in the play testing though!

   The only advantage, really, for low numbers of dragons is that they
   need less lairs. I was t   hinking about this too and was considering
   limiting the number of Dragons to 5 rather t   han allowing a choice;
   or adding in benefits for high-skill dragons.

   A nominated Dragon is any dragon whatsoever. The attacker gets to
   choose! I'm considering n   ot showing the others the Skill Points of
   each others Dragons.
   
   I like the additional cards and will add them in at some point.
   
   
   
Clarifications From Wyrm:
   
   The max number of Dragons a player my have is limited to 5.
   
   You can spread out the Skill Points as mentioned in the Game Start.
   
   A Dragon cannot split its points between two or more bids.
   
   You can only play one card per turn. Though, one can discard all ones
   cards and do nothing e   lse that turn.

   For an email game, if a player doesn't specify which Dragon in a clan
   is to have things h   appen to them by default (e.g. loses 1 SP
   because of the Orphan), the GM will choose one a   t random.

   When playing cards, one often has to nominate Dragons of other Clans
   for the card to e   ffect. If the Dragon you have selected is already
   being effected by another card (long d   uration) then your card has
   no effect on it. It is also possible for several cards to be p  
   layed on a particular Dragon in one turn; and in this case it is the
   lowest number card t   hat effects the Dragon. Only one card can
   effect a Dragon at any one time.
   
   I've also changed the rules for Sparklie Debts. 
   [Note: I don't have the new rules. -EP]
   
   I may halve the requirements for winning.
   
   
   
Additional Afd Trading Game Beta Testing Comments from EP:
   
   A group of 4 of us ran through a game of AFD.  It took us over 5
   hours, we determined by t   he end ether the ending points need to be
   halved, and the cards adjusted accordingly or t   he points that your
   roll need to be doubled or tripled.

   We did find some errors in the game. For example to win the game you
   need 5,000 food, to g   et rid of the  Orphan (card 13) you need to
   spend 10,000 Food. (not that you'd ever get 1   0,000 food in any
   reasonable time)

   You also have one major rule conflict regarding Sparklies, when
   playing for simplicity we u   sed the first rule:

   Also, one also draws cards to make a hand of three and pays any
   Sparklie debts one has m   ounted up. One does not need to pay
   Sparklie debts straight away, but if you don't pay it a   fter the
   third turn, you are detained by the Sparklie Police for one turn
   during which y   our Skill Points don't increase and are drained to
   zero.

   If a Clan has a negative amount of Sparklies at the end of a turn
   then they lose their c   lan status and leave the game.

   We ran into some other things which we modified rules on the spot,
   most of which I don't r   ecall.  The only other big thing we had
   some problems with was the order that card a   ctions are determined.
   Some of the cards if played on the same turn conflict, and there n  
   eeds to be some way to determine which cards effect happens first,
   second, third, etc... i   n those cases. 
   
   Any way, those are my beta testing comments.