Solitaire Mobile Frame: Zero

[Francisco Duarte]

In these days of isolation, I decided to give another try at this idea. Misa actually wrote most of these rules after giving a look at my own early draft, so he should be credited for them as much as I am, or more. I simply added a few bits here and there afterwards.

You must do the deployment for each faction. Do so as if you would your own models and stations.

NOTE: Randomize - attribute a number to each element and roll do decide which.

Play your own Frames normally.

On each enemy Frame's turn:

If unsure about which Frame goes next, randomize. Perform all steps, if possible (if they are incompatible, perform the one that goes first on the list).

- use blue or highest white for defense, unless irrelevant.

- if able, move to the nearest station.
- if able, move to weapon range of an enemy frame (keeping at the station, if any).
- if able, take cover (keeping at the station and weapon range, if applicable).
- if none of these work, advance towards an enemy station.

- attack, if able. Prioritize lowest def minus spot, randomize on a tie. Use OSR if available, one per attack.

- spot, if able. Prioritize enemies in weapon range of your unactivated frames, randomize on a tie.

- If damaged, randomize the ejection of systems.

If lower on points, the enemy won’t bring down the clock this turn.

Tell me what you think, and what you would do differently.

[Ogreboy88]

This is SUPER interesting.

Here's what I would do:

1) In addition to the default behavior flowchart you're working on, I would assemble a bunch of NPC frames and give each one a card that would include:
a) an initiative number to help the AI decide which frame should activate first when it has a choice
b) the order in which the frame will lose its systems when damaged
and c) its own behaviour flowchart which supercedes the default one

This way the AI can field specialized units and have an idea what to do with them.

Cards would also make a handy randomization tool for choosing frames to make up the enemy team: after you build your team, roll a die to determine how many frames the enemy takes and deal that many cards face down. They could also be spruced up with a list of systems, name, pic, and other fanciness.

2) I would establish at least one basic set of AI set-up instructions for attack and defense. If you can come up with more than one option for each and randomize between them, all the better.

3...) It could be really fun to post challenges/scenarios for other players to try to beat...

Cheers!
Ogreboy88

[Starflower]

Glad to see this thing up here!
And I like Ogreboy's idea of "frame cards" - it's definitely something I'd use for the kind of "infinite survival mode" I threw in the air in the Discord chat.

Hmm, I wonder if I should change my handle to Starflower on the MFZ Discord server. But then again, who's counting names?