Social Climber Part 1
This is the game I designed for a competition at work. The theme for the competition was relationships. Naturally, I took the best and worst parts of relationships (the things that amuse me the most)to form Social Climber. This game has not be balanced or play tested! It's mostly just a conceptual framework with some ideas thrown together. It's a bit lame and silly in parts, but I was doing this late at night for fun.
This card game is designed to simulate the often brutal and merciless lengths people will go to reach the top of the social ladder. Ultimately, it is a confrontation between two people, one of whom will make the perilous fall to obscurity and public scorn. The other will become popular.
Each player's deck will be filled with Acquaintance cards. Acquaintances can fall into three relationship categories: Personal Life, Love Life, and Professional Life. The ultimate goal is to destroy your opponent's Coolness. Both players start at 20 Coolness, so a player can win by dropping an opponent to 0 Coolness points. To do this, you must develop your Acquaintances and effectively use your Social Cunning Attacks to inflict misery on your opponent.
You may have as many friends and co-workers as you wish, but only one Romantic Interest. That is, only one "official" Romantic Interest. Having more than one can prove to be troublesome. Think of people as creature cards from Magic: The Gathering. Their relationship with you is their HP, so if your opponent sabotages your relationships, the Acquaintance can no longer be used by you. In some cases, your opponent will gain control of them.
Becoming Acquaintances (Summoning in Magic), and using them to "attack" your opponent has a cost. Like all strategy games, your abilities are limited by your resources. The resource in Social Climber is Popularity. These are fun, colorful cards that illustrate stereotypically "cool" things. Throwing a Party, Being the Smart Kid, Class President, Office Suck Up - these are all examples. Popularity is essentially Land/Mana from Magic: The Gathering.
Each player will form a deck of approximately 45 cards. There is no limit to the number of Acquaintance or Popularity cards the player may use. However, the player may only select 2 of the Social Cunning counter cards. Also, Go to the Gym, Practice Speech, Pick up from Airport, and Kiss Ass may only be placed in the deck once.
A quick summary of terms in Social Climber:
Coolness: Player Hit Points
Relationship: Acquaintance Hit Points/Defense
Popularity: Land/Mana. This is the cost of adding an Acquaintance or using Social Cunning.
Acquaintances: The units of Social Climber. They come in 3 flavors: Friends, Romantic Interests, and Office Mates.
Social Cunning: The "spells" of Social Climber. These can be damaging in many ways.
Read Social Climber Part 2 for the good stuff - Acquaintances.
