Influences on Ad Astra
bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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The "influences" lists on Endeavor and Homesteaders were interesting to read, and seems to raise some interest here, so here's mine about the influences on Ad Astra.
I can't do such a list with my other upcoming games, Pony Express, Letter of Marque and Captain Pirate, which are far less derivative. Ad Astra, on the other hand, is clearly a very classical design inspired by many of the games Serge and I like to play.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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Ad Astra is a resource management and development game about building a space empire.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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Of course, the first influence on Ad Astra is Settlers of Catan. It's a game both Serge and I like a lot, and which I still play occasionally.
The building and production system for this game is directly borrowed from Settlers of Catan. Our idea was to create the same feeling of development one gets when playing Settlers of Catan.
Bruno Cathala and I did borrow the dice system a few years ago in Boomtown, so you can says I have now taken everything from Catan, but in parts.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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I think Puerto Rico was the first game in which a player choses a character for everybody to use, with a small extra privilege for the player who choosed it. Anyway, even when I don't play Puerto Rico anymore these days, that's where I took the idea.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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The programming track with its 12 or 15 spaces might remind you of the way action cards are played in Warrior Knights. Actually, it's more similar with a system we considered when developping the new Warrior Knights but finally didn't use.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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I must admit that I don't remember a lot of Merchant of Venus, since the last time I played it must be ten or fifteen years ago. It's a favorite of Serge who still plays it regularly, and I remmeber him referring to Merchant of Venus a few times while we were working on Ad Astra - I just can't remember when exactly, and what parts of the game were involved.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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Two of my older games, Citadels and Mission: Red Planet both have an in-game system for changing the first player. Last to chose the KIng in Citadels, last to play his character card in Mission: Red Planet.
It's not the main point in Ad Astra, and actually it's a late addition to the game, but it's something I like a lot more than the usual "first player moves clockwise". It always bring some major (Citadels) or minor (Mission: Red Planet and Ad Astra) element to consider in players' choices.
By the way, in Ad Astra, like in Citadels, you can chose to stay the first player. Just start every round with playing a score card on last space. Like in Citadels, however, it's not a winning strategy.
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bruno faidutti
France
LES ANGLES
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Ad Astra and Race for the Galaxy have some things in common, but actually this was not an influence on our design. I even think I played my first game of Race for the Galaxy when the prototype of Ad Astra, named Cassiopeia, was already finalized.
The real point is probably that both Settlers of Catan and Puerto Rico are common influences on both Ad Astra and Race for the Galaxy.
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