Cardboard Edison's Favorite Tips & Resources - November 2015

This month's roundup of great board game design links includes several new entries in our Meaningful Decisions interview series, advice for working with publishers, lessons from a first-time designer, and lots more.

featured:

• Meaningful Decisions: Jason Tagmire on Design Choices in Maximum Throwdown
• Guest Post: The Hidden Work of Game Design
• Meaningful Decisions: T.C. Petty III on Design Choices in VivaJava Dice
• Meaningful Decisions: Donald X. Vaccarino on Design Choices in Dominion

licensing:

• Reasons why a publisher might reject a game even if it's very good
• Publishers answer the question: How do you decide what games you want to publish?
• “Don’t pitch a game to a publisher until you envision it on the store shelf as-is (design-wise), and are happy with that. Then also don’t be surprised or upset if a publisher wants to do some development changes.” - Seth Jaffee

process:

• Lessons from a first-time designer: selecting ideas, delegating authority, defending without getting defensive, killing your darlings and setting deadlines
• Getting your indie tabletop game made: notes from PAX Australia

theory:

• Take-that games: When does this mechanism work and when does it fail?
• The Game Designers of North Carolina podcast on melding theme and mechanisms

playtesting:

• Advice for creating and running a board game design group
• “Playtesting is often that balance between ignoring both the worst criticism and the highest praise to hone in on the juicy middle.” - Dave Chalker

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SENIOR INVENTORS: Steven Cole, John du Bois, Richard Durham, Matthew O’Malley, Isaias Vallejo

JUNIOR INVENTORS: Stephen B Davies, Luis Lara, Behrooz Shahriari, Aidan Short, Jay Treat

ASSOCIATES: Robert Booth, Doug Levandowski, Aaron Lim, Nathan Miller, Marcel Perro

APPRENTICES: Kevin Brusky, Kiva Fecteau, Scott Gottreu, JR Honeycutt, Scott Martel Jr., Marcus Ross, Diane Sauer