LogFAQs > #933127711

73. Word Domination (2017)

Category: Player vs Player, Cooperative
Genres: Word game, area control, spelling
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 30 minutes
Experience: 4 plays over 2 sessions (2017, 2019) with 2-4 players
Previous ranks: NR (2016), NR (2018)

Summary - Letters are laid out, representing territories. Your goal is to use sets of them to form words. Getting multiple uses of a letter can eliminate it and make it yours, and the area control ultimately helps you to win the game. In the co-op variant, you're instead trying to hit every letter with a theme of sawing legs of a building down.

Experience - My first few plays of Word Domination were dull. The area control mechanism seemed take-that-ish and to resist the fun aspect of spelling games. Thus, playing the co-op variant months later was a shock - I absolutely loved it. Having only played that variant twice in one setting, I'm not ready to bump this game super-high.

Design - Why does Word Domination work as a co-op but not as an area control game? Well, part of that probably has to do with the player's appetite for area control. Essentially, in order to claim a letter in the original WD, you want to hit that letter multiple times, ideally in the same word. Letters you don't use enough can be bumped off, which encourages defensive play. Plus, your plans can get foiled turn to turn and you get fewer options as letters get bumped off.

None of that is fun when it comes to word games! You want more options as a game goes on, not fewer, and it's no fun to have to reevaluate each turn instead of being able to plan ahead. The co-op game takes care of pretty much solves every complaint of mine. Instead of having to play defensively and kick other people off of being able to form full words, you get to collaborate and plan ahead (given the board's predictable issues) on how you want to put words together a few turns in advance. Meanwhile, a tactical element with fresh blood of letters gets injected from its spectator mechanic - an increasing number of extra letters that, when it exceeds a certain limit, loses you the game. So you're incentivized to use those letters, but you're still focused on your long-term goals of the "main board" letters. Plus, everyone can join in.

Future - I don't have a burning desire to play Word Domination, but I feel like it could potentially fit a very interesting niche. Cooperative word games are really rare, and the rules overhead is quite low.
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yet all sailors of all sorts are more or less capricious and unreliable - they live in the varying outer weather, and they inhale its fickleness