in which mun Nanseki talks about game systems

so i like tabletop games but don't like throwing large quantities of money at lots of different people or storing lots of items in my nonexistent game shelf (i just toss some stuff in my closet). this makes me really like the idea of the poker deck which for one purchase lets me play every single game on pagat.com!

the poker deck is what is known as a game system, one package that can play multiple games, i like these things so here are a few more!

the decktet

one of the most well known of the alternate game systems, but only because all the others are so obscure

the decktet by P.D. Magnus is a 36 card deck with 6 suits and 10 ranks where all the numeric cards have 2 suits! each suit has one ace (the lowest rank) and one crown (the highest rank), and there are three cards of each number from 2-9 in between. the six suits are moons, suns, waves, leaves, wyrms, and knots, and the numeric cards have two of each.

there are nine extra cards that some games use- two extra ranks between 9 and crown called pawn and court that have four cards with three suits each and one card called the excuse with no markings.

there's also a split between what each card depicts which is marked on each card (personality, location, event) but not every game uses that, it's more commonly used for fortune telling which this deck can do!

here's a wikidot dedicated to the decktet which i edit every once in a while.

the piecepack

the only one good enough for a wikipedia article and even then it's been nominated for deletion twice

the piecepack is an assortment of objects that can be used for board games. the idea behind the piecepack is that it would be the board game equivalent to the poker deck.

in each of the four suits of suns, moons, crowns, and arms, there are six tiles from 0 to 5, six coins from 0 to 5, a die with faces from 0 to 5, and a pawn.

it would be better if it had more games for it but my main problem is with how unreasonably hard it is to get one without just making it yourself.

here's another wiki which has been dead for many years.

the looney pyramids

the real reason the fluxx people are in the board game scene

the Looney Pyramids (also known as Icehouse pieces) are a lineup of little colorful pyramids that can do a lot of weird stuff!

they come in three sizes and 10 11 13 15 colors but you're usually not buying them loose, they mainly come in little game boxes specialized for one game and one big box for playing everything.

you are encouraged to take the pyramids and make your own little games out of them even if you only have the specialized boxes, but the most popular games seem to be Homeworlds and Zendo, respectively abstract strategy and logical deduction.

they also have a wiki, this time hosted on Miraheze!