Auction of the Ages began as a passion project that I worked on solo for about a year and a half of on/off development. My love for card games like Magic: the Gathering and hidden role / social deception games such as Werewolf or Secret Hitler drove me to want to make one of my own. Since I started it, Auction of the Ages has gone through multiple iterations, with mechanics changing between versions of the game.

From the onset my goal was to make a more in-depth and engaging hidden role game that used bidding mechanics and deception. These remained constant throughout all versions of the game and informed my decisions about how I altered the experience based on player feedback and my own opinions about how the game was being played.

The first version of the game was chaotic, fun, and encouraged lots of crazy interactions and silly scenarios to occur. Roles and cards were designed in a way that encouraged creative thinking for the best ways to make use of their abilities. Though it was fun, the rules were confusing and needed to be explained multiple times. Certain roles were far more fun to play than others, and card effects were often seen as too vague, or lacking a consistent tone. Many cards had funny effects, while others had game-defining powerful mechanics. Players were often split. Some enjoyed the sillyness, while others liked the power.

Multiple versions of the game later, version 5, and the game is still in progress. The game has changed a lot since the initial prototype, so I would suggest looking at both documents above for a clear comparison. The core idea of the game - a hidden-role / social deduction game with bidding mechanics, still remains in tact.

For version 5, my goals are to learn from testing throughout development, and not simply assume mechanics will be fun on paper. My plan this time around is to playtest more often and playtest as I adjust things, adding complexity over time and ensuring the experience remains fun. This has been made far easier recently by Tabletop Simulator's custom card importer, which allows us to playtest the game online whenever we can!

Currently, I'm completely overhauling the action system and turning the game's victory condition into a team-based effort. I recognized in version 4 that many of the game's design problems were being shoehorned by the fact that each role had an entirely unique win condition, which I think was the core reason players didn't feel a need to share information or deceive each other.

So far, my approach to testing has been working and the game is much quicker to play and already more interesting on the deception side. I also have teamed up with an artist in order to finally give the cards some much needed art! I hope the current version is the last one!