How To Balance Terraforming Mars
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Terraforming Mars is the newest favorite board game for my wife and I. The two of us have played this game (2-players) at least 30 times, and we’ve played it with four players another half-dozen times. I enjoy the theme, the artwork is very nice, it has a currency mechanism, production mechanism, cards that have special features or abilities, and nice colorful chips. It also has infinite replayability. Ignoring the five starter corporations, there are 12 corporations to choose from which gives each player special abilities. These unique corporations coupled with a massive deck of cards provides a different game experience each time we play.
After playing this game several times in the beginning, too often it felt like one person could run away with it if he received the right cards early in the game. We’ve added two mechanisms to the game which have resulted in incredible balance. The first mechanism is to seed your initial hand with a draft. The game setup requires you to deal each player ten cards. Each player then selects the cards he or she wants, pays 3ME (ME is the game’s currency) for each card and discards the rest.
The way an initial draft works, is that you select a card you want the opportunity to purchase, and then pass the remaining cards to your left. You then select another one card out of the next set you just received, and so on. Once everyone has selected ten cards, you proceed to purchase the ones you actually want. Note that you still don’t have to buy all ten. An initial draft adds some time to the setup. The first four draws will be time consuming, but the 5th and onward selection moves more quickly because you have already seen the cards in your hand once and there are also fewer cards to choose from.
The second mechanism changes how the research phase works. In the research phase, you normally deal each player 4 cards. He then chooses which ones he wants to keep (if any), pays 3ME for each, and discards the remaining. In my modified version, you deal 4 x the number of players to the table creating a “market”. Beginning with the starting player, each player places one of his colored chips on a card he would like to purchase. This continues until everyone has passed. No player can claim more than 4 cards. A player that passes forfeits his opportunity to select from the market for the remainder of the current rounds research phase. Unlike the initial draft, a player must purchase every card he claims. The tradeoff with this change is also time. Players will need more time to review 8, 12, or 16 cards on the table instead of just the four in his hand. For 3 and 4-player games, you may adjust the size of the market accordingly (3 x the number of players, maybe).
Give these two a try and let me know what you think!