{ "title": "Game Mechanic Compendium codebook", "schemaVersion": 20, "license": { "name": "CC BY 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" }, "unit": "One row per mechanic, coded on its canonical form in isolation from any host game.", "files": { "mechanics.json": "Canonical nested export: { schemaVersion, count, license, mechanics[] }. Validated by mechanics.schema.json.", "mechanics.csv": "Wide table, one row per mechanic; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, category, definition, aliases, parent, children, related, referenced_by, media, agency, randomness, interaction, complexity, pacing, information, feedback_loop, decision_density, agency_rank, complexity_rank, decision_density_rank, effects, n_examples, n_sources, n_relations, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (mechanic, example): mechanic_id, mechanic_name, category, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, note, latest.", "edges.csv": "source, target, relation (parent | related); undirected-unique.", "crosstabs.csv": "One row per cell of every pairing of category and the eight properties: dim_a, value_a, dim_b, value_b, count, expected, residual (Pearson), cramers_v (bias-corrected, for the pairing).", "effect-pairs.csv": "Effect pairs carried by at least five mechanics: effect_a, effect_b, together, expected, lift, mechanics.", "property-effects.csv": "Property value and effect combinations carried by at least five mechanics, with shares and lift.", "distances.csv": "Every pair of mechanics with its coding distance: a, b, distance, property_diff, effect_jaccard.", "sources.json": "Bibliography with cited-by lists, each with locator and access date.", "taxonomy.json": "The vocabularies with labels, descriptions, and value order.", "citations.bib": "One BibTeX @misc record per entry.", "abilities.json": "Ability archetypes: { schemaVersion, count, license, abilities[] }. Fields under abilities below.", "abilities.csv": "Wide table, one row per ability; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, function, delivery, gating, definition, aliases, media, mechanics, n_examples, n_sources, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "ability-examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (ability, example): ability_id, ability_name, function, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, gating, note, latest; gating joined with \"|\".", "crafting.json": "Crafting archetypes: { schemaVersion, count, license, crafting[] }. Fields under crafting below.", "crafting.csv": "Wide table, one row per crafting archetype; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, operation, outcomes, requirements, definition, aliases, media, mechanics, n_examples, n_sources, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "crafting-examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (crafting archetype, example): craft_id, craft_name, operation, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, requirements, note, latest; requirements joined with \"|\".", "scaling.json": "Scaling archetypes: { schemaVersion, count, license, scaling[] }. Fields under scaling below.", "scaling.csv": "Wide table, one row per scaling archetype; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, axis, scope, bases, definition, aliases, media, mechanics, n_examples, n_sources, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "scaling-examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (scaling archetype, example): scaling_id, scaling_name, axis, scope, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, basis, note, latest; basis joined with \"|\".", "synergies.json": "Synergy archetypes: { schemaVersion, count, license, synergies[] }. Fields under synergies below.", "synergies.csv": "Wide table, one row per synergy archetype; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, form, scope, links, definition, aliases, media, mechanics, n_examples, n_sources, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "synergy-examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (synergy archetype, example): synergy_id, synergy_name, form, scope, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, links, note, latest; links joined with \"|\".", "weapons.json": "Weapon archetypes: { schemaVersion, count, license, weapons[] }. Fields under weapons below.", "weapons.csv": "Wide table, one row per weapon archetype; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, delivery, kind, limits, definition, aliases, media, mechanics, n_examples, n_sources, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "weapon-examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (weapon archetype, example): weapon_id, weapon_name, delivery, kind, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, limits, note, latest; limits joined with \"|\".", "systems.json": "Game system archetypes: { schemaVersion, count, license, systems[] }. Fields under systems below.", "systems.csv": "Wide table, one row per game system archetype; list fields joined with \"|\". Columns: id, name, status, domain, driver, core, parts, core_parts, definition, aliases, media, mechanics, n_examples, n_sources, word_count, provenance_title, provenance_year, provenance_medium, provenance_confidence, established_title, established_year, established_medium, established_confidence, updated, url.", "system-examples.csv": "Tidy table, one row per (game system archetype, example): system_id, system_name, domain, driver, title, year, year_approx, medium, creator, components, parts, note, latest; components and parts joined with \"|\"." }, "abilities": { "unit": "One row per ability archetype: a named effect that recurs across games, described by its behaviour rather than its name. Abilities carry no design properties or effect tags and do not enter the mechanics exports.", "fields": { "function": "Exactly one primary function (values below).", "delivery": "One or more delivery forms (values below).", "gating": "Union of the gating recorded on the examples, in vocabulary order.", "mechanics": "Ids of 1 to 6 mechanics the ability exercises.", "examples": "Chronological examples; each records the gating of the ability in that game, and one carries latest: true." }, "vocabularies": { "function": [ { "value": "damage", "label": "Damage", "description": "Reduces an opponent’s health or equivalent measure." }, { "value": "control", "label": "Control", "description": "Removes or restricts an opponent’s ability to act or move." }, { "value": "mobility", "label": "Mobility", "description": "Moves the user, or another piece, faster or farther than ordinary movement allows." }, { "value": "protection", "label": "Protection", "description": "Absorbs, blocks, or prevents incoming damage before it lands." }, { "value": "restoration", "label": "Restoration", "description": "Restores lost health or returns a defeated character to play." }, { "value": "enhancement", "label": "Enhancement", "description": "Temporarily improves an ally’s capabilities." }, { "value": "summoning", "label": "Summoning", "description": "Brings a temporary allied entity into play." }, { "value": "concealment", "label": "Concealment", "description": "Hides the user or an ally from opponents." }, { "value": "detection", "label": "Detection", "description": "Reveals hidden state, units, or terrain." }, { "value": "negation", "label": "Negation", "description": "Cancels a spell or ability as it is cast, or ends a spell, enchantment, or condition already in place, on friend or foe." } ], "delivery": [ { "value": "projectile", "label": "Projectile", "description": "Travels through space from the user and can be dodged or blocked in transit." }, { "value": "targeted", "label": "Targeted", "description": "Applies to a chosen target without a travelling object." }, { "value": "area", "label": "Area", "description": "Affects everything within a radius or region." }, { "value": "line", "label": "Line", "description": "Affects everything along a line or beam from the user." }, { "value": "melee", "label": "Melee", "description": "Delivered at contact range." }, { "value": "self", "label": "Self", "description": "Applies to the user." }, { "value": "placed", "label": "Placed", "description": "Creates a persistent object or zone at a chosen location." } ], "gating": [ { "value": "at-will", "label": "At will", "description": "Usable whenever the user can act, at no cost beyond taking the action.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "cooldown", "label": "Cooldown", "description": "Unavailable for a fixed interval of time or turns after each use.", "mechanic": "cooldowns" }, { "value": "ultimate-charge", "label": "Ultimate charge", "description": "A meter filled by time, damage dealt or taken, or objectives; the ability is usable only when the meter is full.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "mana", "label": "Mana", "description": "Each use spends points from a pool shared by several abilities (mana, MP, FP, energy, or mana produced by lands in card games).", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "spell-slots", "label": "Spell slots", "description": "Each use expends a slot of a given level from an allotment restored by rest.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "per-rest", "label": "Per rest", "description": "A fixed number of uses restored by a rest or another narrative interval, without slots.", "mechanic": "downtime-phases" }, { "value": "charges", "label": "Charges", "description": "A small stock of uses that refill one at a time, or a finite stock held on an item.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "consumable", "label": "Consumable", "description": "Each use spends an item or card: a scroll, a potion, a power-up, a card discarded on play.", "mechanic": "inventory-encumbrance" }, { "value": "action-cost", "label": "Action cost", "description": "Each use takes a share of a per-turn action budget.", "mechanic": "action-points" }, { "value": "proc-chance", "label": "Proc chance", "description": "Fires on its own, without being activated, when a trigger such as a hit, an attack roll, or a card draw succeeds on a stated chance.", "mechanic": "procs" } ] } }, "crafting": { "unit": "One row per crafting archetype: a named operation on items that recurs across games, described by its procedure rather than its name. Crafting archetypes carry no design properties or effect tags and do not enter the mechanics exports.", "fields": { "operation": "Exactly one primary operation (values below).", "outcomes": "One or more outcome forms of the canonical archetype (values below).", "requirements": "Union of the requirements recorded on the examples, in vocabulary order.", "mechanics": "Ids of 1 to 6 mechanics the operation runs through.", "examples": "Chronological examples; each records what the operation requires in that game, and one carries latest: true." }, "vocabularies": { "operation": [ { "value": "create", "label": "Create", "description": "Makes a new item from inputs that are used up." }, { "value": "deconstruct", "label": "Deconstruct", "description": "Breaks an item down into materials or components." }, { "value": "modify", "label": "Modify", "description": "Adds, removes, or changes a property of an item already held." }, { "value": "upgrade", "label": "Upgrade", "description": "Raises an item’s tier, level, or grade on a fixed ladder." }, { "value": "combine", "label": "Combine", "description": "Merges two or more items into one." }, { "value": "transfer", "label": "Transfer", "description": "Moves a property, power, or appearance from one item to another." }, { "value": "restore", "label": "Restore", "description": "Returns a worn, broken, or spent item to use." } ], "outcomes": [ { "value": "fixed", "label": "Fixed", "description": "The same inputs always give the same result." }, { "value": "random", "label": "Random", "description": "The result is drawn from a range or a table at the moment of crafting." }, { "value": "failure-chance", "label": "Failure chance", "description": "An attempt can fail, spending its inputs for nothing." }, { "value": "item-loss", "label": "Item loss", "description": "An attempt can destroy, downgrade, or permanently lock the item worked on." }, { "value": "player-skill", "label": "Player skill", "description": "The result depends on the player’s execution or choices in a crafting sequence." }, { "value": "character-skill", "label": "Character skill", "description": "The result depends on a character’s skill rank or a roll against it." } ], "requirements": [ { "value": "no-cost", "label": "No cost", "description": "Needs nothing beyond the item itself and the action: a menu command with no fee, station, or material.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "materials", "label": "Materials", "description": "Spends gathered or dropped raw materials or components.", "mechanic": "resource-gathering" }, { "value": "currency", "label": "Currency", "description": "Spends money, a currency item consumed by the operation, or another spendable pool such as experience levels.", "mechanic": "commodity-currency" }, { "value": "station", "label": "Station", "description": "Must be done at a workbench, forge, vendor, or other fixed place or device.", "mechanic": "base-building" }, { "value": "recipe", "label": "Recipe", "description": "Needs a recipe, schematic, or blueprint the player has found, bought, or unlocked.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "skill-rank", "label": "Skill rank", "description": "Needs a profession or character skill at a minimum rank.", "mechanic": "experience-levels" }, { "value": "reputation", "label": "Reputation", "description": "Needs standing with a faction, guild, or vendor at a minimum level.", "mechanic": "reputation-factions" }, { "value": "sacrificed-item", "label": "Sacrificed item", "description": "Consumes a second finished item, not a raw material.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "modification-budget", "label": "Modification budget", "description": "Each item carries a finite allowance of operations that the operation spends.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "time", "label": "Time", "description": "Takes a span of real or game time to complete.", "mechanic": null } ] } }, "scaling": { "unit": "One row per scaling archetype: a named way in which capability grows, broadens, or is held level across play or across releases, described by how it works rather than its name. Scaling archetypes carry no design properties or effect tags and do not enter the mechanics exports.", "fields": { "axis": "Exactly one axis: vertical, horizontal, or normalizing (values below).", "scope": "Exactly one scope: what scales (values below).", "bases": "Union of the bases recorded on the examples, in vocabulary order.", "mechanics": "Ids of 1 to 6 mechanics the scaling runs through.", "examples": "Chronological examples; each records what the scaled value is keyed to in that game, and one carries latest: true." }, "vocabularies": { "axis": [ { "value": "vertical", "label": "Vertical", "description": "Capability grows in magnitude: larger numbers, higher tiers, a higher ceiling." }, { "value": "horizontal", "label": "Horizontal", "description": "Options or breadth grow while power stays roughly level: more choices, not stronger ones." }, { "value": "normalizing", "label": "Normalizing", "description": "Vertical differences are compressed or cancelled, so that players, enemies, or content of different levels meet on comparable terms." } ], "scope": [ { "value": "character", "label": "Character", "description": "What scales is a character’s own statistics, level, or roster of options." }, { "value": "item", "label": "Item", "description": "What scales is equipment: its tier, level, or the spread of items on offer." }, { "value": "ability", "label": "Ability", "description": "What scales is the magnitude or reach of an ability, spell, or attack." }, { "value": "world", "label": "World", "description": "What scales is the opposition or the world: enemies, zones, encounters." }, { "value": "content", "label": "Content", "description": "What scales is the game across releases: expansions, card sets, seasons." } ], "basis": [ { "value": "character-level", "label": "Character level", "description": "Keyed to a character’s level or experience total.", "mechanic": "experience-levels" }, { "value": "attribute", "label": "Attribute", "description": "Keyed to an attribute or statistic such as strength or intelligence.", "mechanic": "point-buy" }, { "value": "skill-rank", "label": "Skill rank", "description": "Keyed to ranks invested in a skill, talent, or perk.", "mechanic": "skill-trees" }, { "value": "item-tier", "label": "Item tier", "description": "Keyed to the tier, level, or rarity of equipment held.", "mechanic": "loot-tables" }, { "value": "unlock", "label": "Unlock", "description": "Keyed to an option made available by an unlock, without a change in magnitude.", "mechanic": "roguelike-meta-progression" }, { "value": "release", "label": "Release", "description": "Keyed to a release: an expansion, a card set, a season, or a patch.", "mechanic": "seasonal-leagues" }, { "value": "content-level", "label": "Content level", "description": "Keyed to the level assigned to a zone, dungeon, or activity, which sets the level the player is treated as having.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "difficulty-tier", "label": "Difficulty tier", "description": "Keyed to a chosen or unlocked difficulty tier.", "mechanic": "difficulty-settings" }, { "value": "reset", "label": "Reset", "description": "Keyed to a reset that clears or rescales accumulated progress.", "mechanic": "prestige-resets" }, { "value": "real-time", "label": "Real time", "description": "Keyed to time elapsed on the real-world clock, whether or not the game is being played.", "mechanic": "appointment-mechanics" } ] } }, "synergies": { "unit": "One row per synergy archetype: a named way in which two or more parts (items, abilities, cards, units, characters, or states) are worth more together than apart, described by how it works rather than its name. Synergy archetypes carry no design properties or effect tags and do not enter the mechanics exports.", "fields": { "form": "Exactly one form: how the parts combine (values below).", "scope": "Exactly one scope: where the parts sit (values below).", "links": "Union of the links recorded on the examples, in vocabulary order.", "mechanics": "Ids of 1 to 6 mechanics the synergy runs through.", "examples": "Chronological examples; each records what connects the parts in that game, and one carries latest: true." }, "vocabularies": { "form": [ { "value": "threshold", "label": "Threshold", "description": "A bonus switches on when enough matching parts are held or in play together, often in tiers." }, { "value": "cumulative", "label": "Cumulative", "description": "Each matching part adds to the payoff of the others, without breakpoints, so value grows with every part added." }, { "value": "setup-payoff", "label": "Setup and payoff", "description": "One action leaves a state that a later action, from a class of finishers, consumes or exploits for extra effect." }, { "value": "combination", "label": "Combination", "description": "Two specific parts together yield a distinct, named effect that neither has alone." }, { "value": "conversion", "label": "Conversion", "description": "One property, resource, or damage type is turned into another, so investment in one feeds the effects of the other." }, { "value": "loop", "label": "Loop", "description": "Parts trigger one another so that a chain sustains or repeats itself, sometimes without limit." } ], "scope": [ { "value": "build", "label": "Build", "description": "The parts belong to one character or player: equipment, abilities, passives, or upgrades." }, { "value": "team", "label": "Team", "description": "The parts belong to different characters or players on one side." }, { "value": "board", "label": "Board", "description": "The parts are cards, units, or pieces a player has in play." }, { "value": "field", "label": "Field", "description": "The parts meet in the state of a target, terrain, or the environment." } ], "link": [ { "value": "tag", "label": "Tag", "description": "A shared type, tribe, class, faction, or keyword printed on the parts.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "set", "label": "Set", "description": "Membership in a named set whose pieces are designed to be held together.", "mechanic": "set-collection" }, { "value": "status", "label": "Status", "description": "A status, debuff, or condition placed by one part and read by another.", "mechanic": "status-effects" }, { "value": "element", "label": "Element", "description": "An element or damage type carried by the parts.", "mechanic": "damage-types" }, { "value": "position", "label": "Position", "description": "Where the parts stand: adjacency, formation, flanking, or range.", "mechanic": "adjacency-bonuses" }, { "value": "timing", "label": "Timing", "description": "A window or order in which the parts must be used.", "mechanic": "combo-systems" }, { "value": "trigger", "label": "Trigger", "description": "An event fired by one part that sets off another.", "mechanic": "procs" }, { "value": "resource", "label": "Resource", "description": "A pool spent, produced, or converted by the parts.", "mechanic": "resource-conversion" }, { "value": "stat", "label": "Stat", "description": "A statistic or modifier that one part raises and another reads or multiplies.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "relationship", "label": "Relationship", "description": "A bond, affinity, or support rank between characters.", "mechanic": "relationship-systems" } ] } }, "weapons": { "unit": "One row per weapon archetype: a named weapon behaviour, class, rule, or property that recurs across games and belongs to an item or an equipped attack rather than to a character's spell or skill, described by how it works rather than its name. Weapon archetypes carry no design properties or effect tags and do not enter the mechanics exports.", "fields": { "delivery": "Exactly one delivery: how the weapon reaches its target (values below).", "kind": "Exactly one kind: behaviour, class, rule, or property (values below).", "limits": "Union of the limits recorded on the examples, in vocabulary order.", "mechanics": "Ids of 1 to 6 mechanics the weapon archetype runs through.", "examples": "Chronological examples; each records what limits the use of the weapon in that game, and one carries latest: true." }, "vocabularies": { "delivery": [ { "value": "melee", "label": "Melee", "description": "Strikes at contact range or the reach of a held weapon." }, { "value": "thrown", "label": "Thrown", "description": "The weapon itself leaves the hand and travels to the target." }, { "value": "projectile", "label": "Projectile", "description": "Fires or launches a missile with travel time, which can be dodged, led, or blocked in flight." }, { "value": "hitscan", "label": "Hitscan", "description": "Resolves at once along a line from the weapon, with no travel time; continuous beams included." }, { "value": "area", "label": "Area", "description": "The effect is a radius, cone, or region rather than the object that carries it there." }, { "value": "placed", "label": "Placed", "description": "Set down or attached at a location and set off later, by the user or by a timer." }, { "value": "any", "label": "Any delivery", "description": "A rule or property that applies to weapons whatever their delivery, with no single delivery dominant." } ], "kind": [ { "value": "behaviour", "label": "Behaviour", "description": "One way a weapon acts, found on weapons of many classes." }, { "value": "class", "label": "Class", "description": "A named type of weapon whose identity is a bundle of traits: range, damage profile, rate, handling." }, { "value": "rule", "label": "Rule", "description": "A system that governs the use of all or most weapons in a game." }, { "value": "property", "label": "Property", "description": "A trait or tag printed on, or attached to, individual weapons." } ], "limit": [ { "value": "unlimited", "label": "Unlimited", "description": "Usable whenever the user can act, with no stock, meter, or wear.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "ammunition", "label": "Ammunition", "description": "Each use spends rounds, arrows, or charges from a finite carried stock that must be found or bought.", "mechanic": "inventory-encumbrance" }, { "value": "magazine", "label": "Magazine", "description": "Only so many uses before the weapon must be reloaded, which takes time or an action.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "heat", "label": "Heat", "description": "Use builds heat or a similar meter; at the cap the weapon stops until it cools.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "charge-time", "label": "Charge time", "description": "The weapon must be held, drawn, or wound up before it fires, and the wait sets or scales the effect.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "durability", "label": "Durability", "description": "Use wears the weapon down until it breaks, weakens, or must be repaired.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "stamina", "label": "Stamina", "description": "Each attack spends from a stamina or fatigue pool shared with other actions.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "cooldown", "label": "Cooldown", "description": "Unavailable for a fixed interval of time or turns after each use.", "mechanic": "cooldowns" }, { "value": "action-cost", "label": "Action cost", "description": "Each use takes a share of a per-turn action budget, or a whole action.", "mechanic": "action-points" } ] } }, "systems": { "unit": "One row per game system archetype: a named composite subsystem that recurs across games, whose identity is the interaction of three or more catalog mechanics around persistent state, described by how it works rather than its name. Game system archetypes carry no design properties or effect tags and do not enter the mechanics exports.", "fields": { "domain": "Exactly one domain: what the system simulates (values below).", "driver": "Exactly one driver: what moves the system's state (values below).", "core": "Ids of the mechanics every example names as a component, sorted by name.", "parts": "Union of the parts recorded on the examples, in vocabulary order (schema v18).", "core_parts": "Parts every example records, in vocabulary order.", "mechanics": "Ids of 3 to 8 core mechanics the system combines.", "examples": "Chronological examples; each records as components the ids of the 2 to 8 mechanics it combines in that game, and the system's working parts there; one carries latest: true." }, "vocabularies": { "domain": [ { "value": "environment", "label": "Environment", "description": "The world itself: time of day, weather, seasons, elements, and terrain." }, { "value": "inhabitants", "label": "Inhabitants", "description": "Non-player characters and creatures as agents: rivals, routines, and ecology." }, { "value": "society", "label": "Society", "description": "Law, factions, and territory: collective bodies that hold an attitude or ground." }, { "value": "economy", "label": "Economy", "description": "Prices, production, and demand across a simulated population or market." }, { "value": "body", "label": "Body", "description": "The avatar's physiology: needs, injury, and exposure." }, { "value": "pacing", "label": "Pacing", "description": "Systems that meter encounters and intensity over a session." } ], "driver": [ { "value": "clock", "label": "Clock", "description": "State advances on a schedule that could be printed in advance." }, { "value": "player-action", "label": "Player action", "description": "State builds up or decays from what the player does." }, { "value": "autonomous", "label": "Autonomous", "description": "Simulated agents or processes change state on their own rules, whether or not the player acts." }, { "value": "adaptive", "label": "Adaptive", "description": "The system reads the player's state or performance and adjusts to it." } ], "part": [ { "value": "world-clock", "label": "World clock", "description": "An in-game clock or calendar of hours, days, or seasons that advances during play and that other parts read.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "conditional-spawn", "label": "Conditional spawn", "description": "What appears (enemies, creatures, resources, events) is drawn according to the system's state: the hour, the weather, the tier, the intensity.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "escalation", "label": "Escalation", "description": "One state rises through ordered tiers or levels, each bringing a stronger response or harder content.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "return-to-rest", "label": "Return to rest", "description": "The state falls back toward rest when the player stops feeding it: breaking contact, hiding, waiting out a relax phase.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "paid-reset", "label": "Paid reset", "description": "The state is cleared at once by paying a price: a fine, a bribe, time in jail, a lost ship or possession.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "drain", "label": "Drain", "description": "The player's meters run down with time or activity and must be refilled: hunger, warmth, fuel, immunity.", "mechanic": "needs-and-moods" }, { "value": "exposure", "label": "Exposure", "description": "Conditions of the environment (cold, wet, darkness, storm) act on the bodies or units present in them.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "propagation", "label": "Propagation", "description": "State passes from a place or entity to its neighbours by rule: fire, flood, disease, influence.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "agent-memory", "label": "Agent memory", "description": "The system records individual past encounters with the player and acts on them later.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "rank-hierarchy", "label": "Rank hierarchy", "description": "Non-player agents hold ranks or positions in a structure that change through play: promotion, succession, overlords.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "routines", "label": "Routines", "description": "Non-player agents follow timed sequences of places and activities.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "agent-needs", "label": "Agent needs", "description": "Simulated agents (creatures, residents, populations) have needs and act to meet them: feeding, hunting, buying, moving.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "population-change", "label": "Population change", "description": "The numbers of simulated agents rise and fall through birth, death, migration, or growth.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "demand", "label": "Demand", "description": "An aggregate measure of unmet demand for goods, land use, or services drives what the simulation produces or builds.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "territory-change", "label": "Territory change", "description": "Control of places passes between non-player sides through the simulation.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "treatment", "label": "Treatment", "description": "A lasting condition clears only through a remedy matched to it: an item, skill, facility, or rest.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "intensity-reading", "label": "Intensity reading", "description": "The system estimates the player's state or performance (stress, health, progress) and acts on the estimate.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "forecast", "label": "Forecast", "description": "The system's coming state is shown or signalled in advance: a forecast, a demand meter, a tier display, a calendar.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "lasting-damage", "label": "Lasting damage", "description": "Damage to terrain or structures persists and changes paths, cover, or lines of sight.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "report-step", "label": "Report step", "description": "The state changes only when a witness, guard, or sensor reports what it saw, and the report can be stopped.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "aid-lockout", "label": "Aid lockout", "description": "While the state lasts, the player's aids (radar, map, travel, saving, shops) are withdrawn.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "contentment", "label": "Contentment", "description": "A stored measure of a population's satisfaction feeds what it yields (taxes, levies, labour) and, at its low end, unrest or revolt.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "succession", "label": "Succession", "description": "When a holder dies or is removed, positions and holdings pass to heirs or successors by rule.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "side-relations", "label": "Side relations", "description": "Non-player sides hold relations with one another (war, peace, alliance) that change through play.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "headcount-scaling", "label": "Headcount scaling", "description": "Challenge or reward scales to the number of players present.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "contribution-reward", "label": "Contribution reward", "description": "Rewards are graded by each participant's share of the work.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "costly-rest", "label": "Costly rest", "description": "Recovery needs a place, time, or price, and can be interrupted or refused.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "containment", "label": "Containment", "description": "Barriers, isolation, or quarantine block or slow what spreads.", "mechanic": null }, { "value": "capacity-load", "label": "Capacity and load", "description": "A capacity (a plant's output, a road's width, a store's size) is weighed against the load placed on it, and overload or shortfall degrades what it serves.", "mechanic": null } ] } }, "fields": { "id": "Stable identifier; the filename and URL slug.", "name": "Title Case name.", "status": "Documentary completeness, not a filter.", "category": "Exactly one primary family, chosen by the tie-break order below.", "definition": "One sentence, at most 240 characters.", "aliases": "Other names in common use.", "parent": "Id of the mechanic this one specialises, or null.", "children": "Ids of declared or derived children, sorted by name.", "related": "Ids of 2 to 6 related mechanics.", "referenced_by": "Ids of entries that link here and are not already in related.", "media": "Media for which the entry gives at least one example.", "properties": "The eight coded design properties (values below).", "property_ranks": "Integer rank (0-based) for the ordinal properties only.", "property_notes": "Which game the canonical form was coded from and the losing value of any contested coding.", "effects": "2 to 6 player-experience effect tags.", "examples": "Chronological examples; exactly one carries latest: true (the most widely played 2020+ game in the canonical form, or 2015+ as a fallback).", "provenance": "Earliest documented use with a confidence level; title and year are absent when confidence is unknown.", "established": "The game that set the form the definition describes, the one later games demonstrably took it from (schema v11), with its own confidence (established_confidence values below). It repeats the provenance title when the earliest use also set the form, and is null when no establishing game is named.", "sources": "Canonical references (by key) and inline citations; url only for a page fetched and seen to support the claim, with accessed date.", "n_examples": "Count of examples.", "n_sources": "Count of sources.", "n_relations": "Parent + children + related.", "word_count": "Words in the body under the six standard headings.", "updated": "ISO date of the last edit.", "url": "Site path of the entry." }, "vocabularies": { "status": [ { "value": "draft", "label": "Draft", "description": "Skeleton or incomplete entry. Rendered with a banner and excluded from search." }, { "value": "unverified", "label": "Unverified", "description": "Complete entry whose sources or provenance have not yet been checked against primary material." }, { "value": "verified", "label": "Verified", "description": "Complete entry with three or more examples; two or more sources, at least one not a wiki, including a book, paper, or rulebook with a locator; and provenance at high or medium confidence." } ], "category": [ { "value": "resource-management", "label": "Resource management", "description": "Acquiring, holding, converting, and spending finite quantities that constrain what a player can do." }, { "value": "chance-and-risk", "label": "Chance & risk", "description": "A randomiser (dice, decks, tables, generators) or a deliberate wager against known odds is the identity of the mechanic." }, { "value": "progression-and-capability", "label": "Progression & capability", "description": "What a player or avatar is able to do and how that capability set changes within or across sessions, including asymmetric starting capability." }, { "value": "space-and-position", "label": "Space & position", "description": "Position, adjacency, territory, or line of sight on a spatial representation is the operative state." }, { "value": "information-and-hidden-state", "label": "Information & hidden state", "description": "Who knows what: concealment, revelation, and asymmetry of game state between players or between player and system." }, { "value": "interaction-and-exchange", "label": "Interaction & exchange", "description": "The core act is a transaction or contest between players over shared or transferable things: trading, bidding, drafting, voting." }, { "value": "time-and-action-structure", "label": "Time & action structure", "description": "Partitioning play into units (turns, phases, real time) and rationing how many or which actions may be taken within them." }, { "value": "action-resolution", "label": "Action resolution", "description": "Adjudicating whether an attempted action succeeds and how the result is graded and interpreted, independent of which randomiser (if any) is used." }, { "value": "narrative-and-choice", "label": "Narrative & choice", "description": "Structuring authored or emergent story: branching, consequence, reputation, and persistence of decisions across sessions." }, { "value": "puzzle-and-pattern", "label": "Puzzle & pattern", "description": "The central challenge is recognising, assembling, or deducing patterns under constraints, where a solution is in principle determinable." } ], "category_tiebreak_order": [ "action-resolution", "chance-and-risk", "information-and-hidden-state", "interaction-and-exchange", "progression-and-capability", "time-and-action-structure", "resource-management", "space-and-position", "narrative-and-choice", "puzzle-and-pattern" ], "media": [ { "value": "video", "label": "Video", "description": "Digital games on any platform." }, { "value": "tabletop-rpg", "label": "Tabletop RPG", "description": "Role-playing games with a facilitator or shared fiction, including solo journaling games." }, { "value": "board-card", "label": "Board & card", "description": "Board games, card games, dice games, and wargames, including app-assisted ones." }, { "value": "physical", "label": "Physical", "description": "Sports, playground games, LARP, escape rooms, and dexterity games. Secondary: used for provenance and cross-medium comparison, never as an entry’s only medium." }, { "value": "print", "label": "Print", "description": "Printed puzzles and gamebooks: pencil puzzles, newspaper and magazine puzzle columns, and choose-your-path books. Secondary: used for provenance and cross-medium comparison, never as an entry’s only medium." } ], "confidence": [ { "value": "high", "label": "High", "description": "Earliest use is documented in a primary source or uncontested in the design literature." }, { "value": "medium", "label": "Medium", "description": "A widely cited earliest use exists but earlier instances are plausible or the dating is loose." }, { "value": "low", "label": "Low", "description": "The named earliest use is the earliest documented instance found, but earlier instances are plausible or the evidence is thin, so it is not defended as an origin." }, { "value": "unknown", "label": "Unknown", "description": "No defensible earliest use; only a populariser or a period can be named." } ], "established_confidence": [ { "value": "high", "label": "High", "description": "Contemporary sources or the design literature credit this game with setting the form, and later games demonstrably follow it." }, { "value": "medium", "label": "Medium", "description": "Widely credited with setting the form, but the line from it to later games is loosely documented." }, { "value": "low", "label": "Low", "description": "The best candidate the evidence supports, on a thin documented lineage." } ], "source_type": [ { "value": "book", "label": "Book", "description": "Monograph or edited volume." }, { "value": "paper", "label": "Paper", "description": "Peer-reviewed or workshop paper." }, { "value": "article", "label": "Article", "description": "Magazine, blog, or news article." }, { "value": "talk", "label": "Talk", "description": "Conference talk or lecture." }, { "value": "video", "label": "Video", "description": "Video essay or documentary." }, { "value": "podcast", "label": "Podcast", "description": "Audio episode." }, { "value": "wiki", "label": "Wiki", "description": "Community-edited reference such as BoardGameGeek or Wikipedia." }, { "value": "rulebook", "label": "Rulebook", "description": "Primary rules text of a game." }, { "value": "website", "label": "Website", "description": "Other web page." }, { "value": "interview", "label": "Interview", "description": "Published interview with a designer." } ], "properties": { "agency": { "label": "Player agency", "description": "How much the outcome of one invocation varies with the player’s choice at that moment.", "ordinal": true, "guideline": "Low: outcome mostly fixed by prior state or chance (loot tables, saving throws). Medium: one meaningful choice among a small constrained set (push your luck: stop or continue). High: an open choice space where selection dominates outcome (worker placement, drafting).", "values": [ { "value": "low", "label": "low", "description": "Outcome mostly fixed by prior state or chance.", "rank": 0 }, { "value": "medium", "label": "medium", "description": "One meaningful choice among a small, constrained set.", "rank": 1 }, { "value": "high", "label": "high", "description": "Open choice space where selection dominates the outcome.", "rank": 2 } ] }, "randomness": { "label": "Randomness", "description": "Whether chance is resolved before the decision (input), after it (output), both, or not at all.", "ordinal": false, "guideline": "Input = randomness resolved before the player decides (a dealt hand, dice rolled then allocated, a generated map). Output = randomness resolved after the decision (an attack roll, a loot drop). Code \"both\" only when the canonical form has both stages.", "values": [ { "value": "none", "label": "none", "description": "No randomiser in the canonical form." }, { "value": "input", "label": "input", "description": "Chance resolved before the player decides." }, { "value": "output", "label": "output", "description": "Chance resolved after the player decides." }, { "value": "both", "label": "both", "description": "Both stages are intrinsic to the canonical form." } ] }, "interaction": { "label": "Interaction", "description": "How the mechanic couples players to one another.", "ordinal": false, "guideline": "Solo: operates identically regardless of other players. Indirect: players affect each other only through shared state without targeting (blocking a worker space, depleting a market). Direct: targeted effects on a specific opponent. Cooperative: a shared goal is intrinsic to the mechanic (hidden roles is not cooperative, whatever its information coding; team-based is mixed). Mixed: canonical implementations routinely span two or more. Opponents controlled by the game system are not players: a mechanic whose canonical form pits one player against the system codes solo; code direct only when the canonical form targets another human player.", "values": [ { "value": "solo", "label": "solo", "description": "Operates identically regardless of other players." }, { "value": "indirect", "label": "indirect", "description": "Players affect each other only through shared state, without targeting." }, { "value": "direct", "label": "direct", "description": "Targeted effects on a specific opponent." }, { "value": "cooperative", "label": "cooperative", "description": "A shared goal is intrinsic to the mechanic." }, { "value": "mixed", "label": "mixed", "description": "Canonical implementations routinely span two or more modes." } ] }, "complexity": { "label": "Complexity", "description": "Rules weight needed to teach the mechanic on its own, not its strategic depth.", "ordinal": true, "guideline": "Low: one or two sentences, no exceptions. Medium: a paragraph with one to three sub-rules or timing exceptions; a single lookup table on its own is medium. High: several interacting tables, prerequisite graphs, or multiple interacting sub-rules.", "values": [ { "value": "low", "label": "low", "description": "One or two sentences, no exceptions.", "rank": 0 }, { "value": "medium", "label": "medium", "description": "A paragraph with a few sub-rules or timing exceptions, or a single lookup table.", "rank": 1 }, { "value": "high", "label": "high", "description": "Several interacting tables, prerequisite graphs, or interacting sub-rules.", "rank": 2 } ] }, "pacing": { "label": "Pacing effect", "description": "Effect on the rate at which play approaches an end condition or climax, or on turn length.", "ordinal": false, "guideline": "Accelerates: snowballs or forces endings (clocks, end-game triggers a player can pull forward). Decelerates: lengthens turns or stalls progress (large-hand management, hit-point attrition). Variable: depends heavily on parameters (procedural generation, difficulty settings). Neutral: no systematic effect.", "values": [ { "value": "accelerates", "label": "accelerates", "description": "Snowballs or forces endings." }, { "value": "decelerates", "label": "decelerates", "description": "Lengthens turns or stalls progress." }, { "value": "neutral", "label": "neutral", "description": "No systematic effect on pace." }, { "value": "variable", "label": "variable", "description": "Depends heavily on parameters." } ] }, "information": { "label": "Information", "description": "Visibility of the mechanic’s own state.", "ordinal": false, "guideline": "Scope is the mechanic’s own state. Perfect: all relevant state is public. Hidden: concealed from everyone (a shuffled draw order). Asymmetric: some players know what others do not (fog of war, a private hand). Mixed: both hidden and asymmetric components are intrinsic. State known only to the game system and to no player is hidden; state known to a human referee or game master but not to the other players is asymmetric.", "values": [ { "value": "perfect", "label": "perfect", "description": "All relevant state is public." }, { "value": "hidden", "label": "hidden", "description": "Concealed from everyone." }, { "value": "asymmetric", "label": "asymmetric", "description": "Some players know what others do not." }, { "value": "mixed", "label": "mixed", "description": "Both hidden and asymmetric components are intrinsic." } ] }, "feedback_loop": { "label": "Feedback loop", "description": "Whether success makes further success more likely, less likely, neither, or is self-damped.", "ordinal": false, "guideline": "Positive: success compounds (engine building, experience levels). Negative: success is penalised or trailing players are compensated (catch-up bonuses, handicap stones given to the weaker player). None: no systematic coupling. Mixed: the canonical form contains a built-in damper (deck dilution in deck-building).", "values": [ { "value": "positive", "label": "positive", "description": "Success compounds." }, { "value": "negative", "label": "negative", "description": "Success is penalised or trailing players are compensated." }, { "value": "none", "label": "none", "description": "No systematic coupling between past and future success." }, { "value": "mixed", "label": "mixed", "description": "A positive loop with a built-in damper, or both directions present." } ] }, "decision_density": { "label": "Decision density", "description": "Decision points one player faces in one turn’s use of the mechanic, counted without regard to how much each matters (that is agency).", "ordinal": true, "guideline": "Count within one turn of the player using the mechanic. Where the mechanic spans several players’ turns without resetting (an auction from lot to sale, a trick from lead to take), count that player’s decisions until it resets. Where play has no turns, count within one encounter in real-time play, or one move in a puzzle solved alone. A decision point is a moment where the rules give the player two or more legal options. Count decision points, not options: choosing among twenty spaces is one decision point. Count only choices the mechanic itself creates: choices made through other mechanics the game also has do not count, and a mechanic that is a constraint, a tally, or a frame with no choices of its own has zero. A referee’s or game master’s rulings on outcomes are adjudication, not decision points; where the mechanic is a menu of choices for the game master (GM moves), count those choices. Inputs that test execution (timing a jump, steadying an aim) are not decision points; count only choices between routes, targets, or tactics. Where the count varies, code the typical count in the canonical form. Code density without looking at agency; the two often disagree. Low: zero or one (victory points, initiative order, placing one stone in Hex, playing one card to a trick, the clue-giver’s turn in Codenames). Medium: two or three (set collection: which card to take and whether to cash in a set; cover systems: whether to move and to which cover). High: four or more (a deck-building turn of playing and buying cards, spending an action-point budget).", "values": [ { "value": "low", "label": "low", "description": "Zero or one decision point per turn.", "rank": 0 }, { "value": "medium", "label": "medium", "description": "Two or three decision points per turn.", "rank": 1 }, { "value": "high", "label": "high", "description": "Four or more decision points per turn.", "rank": 2 } ] } }, "effects": [ { "value": "mastery", "label": "Mastery", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Perceived growth of player skill through repeated use of the mechanic." }, { "value": "discovery", "label": "Discovery", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Pleasure of uncovering previously unknown content, rules, or state." }, { "value": "planning", "label": "Planning", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Satisfaction from constructing multi-step plans and seeing them resolve." }, { "value": "inference", "label": "Inference", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Reasoning from partial evidence to a conclusion about hidden state." }, { "value": "engine-satisfaction", "label": "Engine satisfaction", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Gratification from a built system producing escalating output." }, { "value": "analysis-paralysis", "label": "Analysis paralysis", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Decision slowdown caused by many comparable options with calculable consequences." }, { "value": "spatial-reasoning", "label": "Spatial reasoning", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Reasoning about position, adjacency, paths, and lines on a represented space." }, { "value": "execution", "label": "Execution", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Outcome depends on the player’s timing or physical precision rather than on which option is chosen." }, { "value": "calculation", "label": "Calculation", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Outcome rewards exact enumeration of moves, counts, or odds within a bounded, fully specified space." }, { "value": "recall", "label": "Recall", "group": "cognitive", "group_label": "Cognitive", "description": "Outcome depends on retaining and retrieving state or sequences seen earlier in play." }, { "value": "tension", "label": "Tension", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "An outcome that matters is held unresolved over a span of play the mechanic itself creates, while the player keeps acting or must wait." }, { "value": "flow", "label": "Flow", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Absorbed, continuous engagement produced by well-matched challenge and feedback." }, { "value": "ownership", "label": "Ownership", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Sense that an artefact (character, deck, map, story) is distinctively the player’s own." }, { "value": "consequence-weight", "label": "Consequence weight", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Heightened awareness that decisions are irreversible or costly." }, { "value": "frustration-risk", "label": "Frustration risk", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Propensity to produce feelings of unfairness or helplessness, typically from low-agency loss." }, { "value": "sunk-cost", "label": "Sunk cost", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Reluctance to abandon invested positions even when suboptimal." }, { "value": "fear-of-missing-out", "label": "Fear of missing out", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Anxiety over opportunities others may take or windows that are closing." }, { "value": "spectacle", "label": "Spectacle", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Rare, amplified, or staged outcomes produce memorable peaks distinct from sustained uncertainty." }, { "value": "compulsion", "label": "Compulsion", "group": "emotional", "group_label": "Emotional", "description": "Habit-forming pull to return or repeat, produced by scheduled rewards or escalating counters rather than by decision quality." }, { "value": "bluffing", "label": "Bluffing", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "Incentive to misrepresent one’s state or intentions." }, { "value": "negotiation", "label": "Negotiation", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "Incentive to bargain, promise, or form deals with other players." }, { "value": "social-deduction", "label": "Social deduction", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "Reading other players’ behaviour to infer hidden roles or intent." }, { "value": "kingmaking", "label": "Kingmaking", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "A player who cannot win can decide which other player does." }, { "value": "teamwork", "label": "Teamwork", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "Coordination and shared problem-solving among players with a common goal." }, { "value": "alpha-player", "label": "Alpha player", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "One player directs the decisions of others in a shared-goal structure, reducing their effective agency." }, { "value": "betrayal", "label": "Betrayal", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "Incentive or opportunity to break an alliance or shared goal for individual gain." }, { "value": "contested-fairness", "label": "Contested fairness", "group": "social", "group_label": "Social", "description": "Players are prone to dispute an outcome’s legitimacy because a human judgement or a deliberate asymmetry intervened in it." }, { "value": "runaway-leader", "label": "Runaway leader", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "A leading position becomes self-reinforcing and hard to overturn." }, { "value": "catch-up", "label": "Catch-up", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "Trailing players gain compensatory advantage." }, { "value": "emergent-narrative", "label": "Emergent narrative", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "Memorable stories arise from system interaction rather than authored content." }, { "value": "replayability", "label": "Replayability", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "Variation across plays that sustains interest." }, { "value": "downtime", "label": "Downtime", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "Periods where a player waits while others act." }, { "value": "grind", "label": "Grind", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "Repetition required to make progress, with low per-repetition novelty." }, { "value": "volatility", "label": "Volatility", "group": "structural", "group_label": "Structural", "description": "Outcomes swing substantially on single events." } ] } }